Simone Lukas had invited city council and youth advisory board members
For years, Simone Lukas has been taking care of the city's partnerships between Homburg and the towns of La Baule and Ilmenau. At the family and children's festival last weekend, she was once again able to welcome guests from Ilmenau in Thuringia to Homburg.
Not only had five members of the city council from the partner city come to Homburg for this weekend, but also three young people, members of the children and youth council, had come to Saarland, also to get to know members of the still quite young Homburg youth council. Among them was also the chairman from Ilmenau, Christophe Macholdt, who had already been to Homburg four times to exchange ideas with young people and to participate in projects at the Saar-Pfalz-Gymnasium.
The advisory council from Ilmenau has existed for eleven years. The members are pleased that there is now also a youth advisory council in Homburg. The young people had already exchanged ideas in writing and online; now they are planning a meeting in Ilmenau. The youth advisory council in Homburg is supervised and supported by Laura Becker from the children and youth office, who also attended all the meetings this weekend.
After some guests and hosts were able to meet for the first time on Friday, the guests from Ilmenau and the Homburg Youth Advisory Council presented themselves with their own booths at the Family and Children's Festival, which were set up directly next to each other near the stage. At both booths, information was available; the Ilmenau group brought along a lot of brochures and flyers about the special features of the Thuringian Goethe and university town. Extensive informational material about TU Ilmenau was also available, whose wide range of study programs is likely to be of interest to young people from Saarland as well. Children and teenagers could also engage artistically with the professional French cartoonist and illustrator Christophe Tupinier. Simone Lukas was also involved in supervising the booths.
After the opening of the Family and Children's Festival by Mayor Michael Forster, he also welcomed the guests from Ilmenau, the deputy mayor Eckhard Bauerschmidt as well as the council members Kurt Retzlaff, Rolf Macholdt, Dr. Hans Schwieger and Christian Hansch, along with members of the Children and Youth Council from the partner city.
After a sightseeing tour through Homburg, during which the Schlossberg caves attracted special interest, the guests met in the evening for a shared meal in the city center to exchange ideas with Deputy Mayor Christine Becker and council members Nathalie Kroj, Pascale Conigliaro, and Sevim Kara-Kraradag and to discuss further possibilities for the partnership. At the beginning of the evening, which was also attended by members of both youth councils, Simone Lukas addressed the significance of the partnership and emphasized the role that exchange and togetherness could play for Germany, which aims to grow closer and advance innovatively together, as well as for peaceful coexistence in Europe. Thus, it became a long, shared evening. After the partially shared breakfast on Sunday, the delegation from Ilmenau had to depart again.
From Simone Lukas's perspective, the discussions between the city councilors East and West can further bring together, draw attention to common projects, and help shape them. The participants want to take these ideas back to their factions to explore and initiate opportunities and possibilities. Regardless of the political level, all residents of Homburg can establish contacts with people from Ilmenau through clubs and institutions, but also personally, according to the partnership commissioner. She is happy to support interested parties in this.
