One thing is certain after the upcoming municipal elections in Aa and Hunze, the municipality will have a council with new faces. All three aldermen, Kiena ten Brink (PvdA), Richard Heling (VVD) and Ivo Berghuis (Municipal Interests Aa and Hunze), will step down after this term of office.
Only mayor Anno Wietze Hiemstra will remain in office. He will form the Municipal Executive with three new aldermen.
Changes in the council, residents of Aa and Hunze must have almost gotten used to it by now. Because in recent years a lot has changed in the plush in the town hall. In May 2022, Mayor Hiemstra started the administrative period with Ten Brink, Berghuis and Bas Luinge (VVD) as aldermen.
Luinge is the experienced councilor, he has just completed a four-year administrative term. But the Rolden resident will suffer a cerebral infarction in 2023. Luinge then wants to return and is working hard on his recovery. In the meantime, VVD politician Nynke Houwing, who was previously an alderman in Borger-Odoorn, is flown in as a replacement. For a maximum of two terms, she indicates. Because Luinge’s recovery does not yet allow a return, a new temporary replacement must be found after two periods of sixteen weeks. That will be Richard Heling, at that time party leader of the VVD in the municipal council.
Ultimately it becomes clear that Luinge will not return at all. It turns out not to be physically possible. Temporary replacement Heling will be the permanent replacement. He remains the owner of his company Heling & Partners, but is responsible for the day-to-day management of a colleague.
After serving on the city council for eight years and as alderman for two years, Heling announces that he is doing something different. He thinks it’s time to make a different choice. “It is an honorable and special role to work as an alderman. A beautiful and very varied position that I fulfill with great pleasure. I will continue to dedicate myself fully to our beautiful municipality in the last months of my aldermanship.”
Ivo Berghuis also feels it is a great privilege to be able to work ‘for the interests of our beautiful municipality and its many involved residents.’ But recently he wondered whether continuing his work as a councilor would be the right path. The short answer: no.
“Political office, especially at the level of alderman, requires a significant investment of time and energy. After twelve years of political and social involvement, I have now consciously chosen to make room for other new challenges.” Berghuis wants more balance between work and private life.
Kiena ten Brink also speaks of a special and honorable time as alderman. “After years of full commitment to our beautiful municipality of Aa en Hunze, I want to make room for other things that are also important to me.”