Dear fellow citizens,
What a year lies behind us - at first, you and I thought that the restrictions imposed by the coronavirus pandemic and the associated uncertainties for our private and professional lives would soon be over. And then came Russia's terrible war of aggression against Ukraine, in violation of international law, with all its consequences, which we all clearly feel and which shake us to the core.
This Christmas will also be different for you and all of us than before the pandemic: fears for the future, even existential fears, will also be present in many households in our city over the Christmas period. That is why my Christmas greeting this year is all about hope. Our former Federal President Richard von Weizsäcker once said: "Hope takes us further than fear." And it is precisely in this spirit that I would like to use my words to encourage you to look to the future with optimism, despite all the uncertainties.
Dear fellow citizens,
Housing and caring for the refugees arriving here has been an unplanned Herculean task this year, which has once again placed great demands on clubs, associations and our entire urban society, but also on the employees of the city administration following the refugee crisis since 2015 and the coronavirus pandemic that has been ongoing since 2020. Collective accommodation and rented apartments had to be prepared, reception procedures and services had to be organized, the integration of children into our daycare centres and schools had to be managed, fundraising campaigns had to be planned and carried out and much, much more.
I am proud of what everyone involved has done together for the people arriving here. This shows me once again that Salzgitter stands together and pulls together, especially in crisis situations. And I would like to thank everyone involved on behalf of the city and personally.
And it is precisely with this conviction of making the world a better place - at least in relation to our lovable home town of Salzgitter - that we have achieved a lot this year and set things in motion, which I would now like to tell you about:
This year, we have launched five pioneering construction projects in the areas of childcare and education. Using subsidies from the state of Lower Saxony from the 50 million Salzgitterhilfe and from the integration fund, we as a city are currently planning the construction of two elementary school in Lichtenberg and Salzgitter-Bad as well as three daycare centers in Thiede, Lichtenberg and Salzgitter-Bad. The total costs for this amount to 49.1 million euros, with construction of all five buildings set to begin in the second half of next year and the facilities scheduled to open in 2025 and 2026. Planning and implementing five major construction projects in parallel, equipped with climate-friendly and energy-saving photovoltaics and heat pumps in line with the times, is a mammoth task, even for my experts in the administration. Another "construction site" after the lockdowns of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020 and 2021 is our city centers of Lebenstedt and Salzgitter-Bad. The businesses there were severely affected by the closures and still are due to declining purchasing power and growing consumption via online retail. With the help of funding from the European Union and the state of Lower Saxony, we want to promote the revitalization of our inner cities. Two climate-friendly forums are to be built in Lebenstedt and Salzgitter-Bad in the coming year. Solar benches with Wi-Fi and cell phone charging stations, digital information walls, children's play trails and the procurement of energy-saving LED Christmas lighting are also planned in both districts. In Lebenstedt, we are also building a barrier-free toilet facility, which is currently not available. Together, all of these measures will significantly improve the quality of time spent shopping in our two city centers. My request to you: take advantage of the services offered by the businesses in our city. A stroll through the city center combined with a shopping trip or two is always a nice leisure activity and has the advantage that you have what you buy in your hand.
Progress is also being made in realigning our city as Lower Saxony's innovative third-largest industrial location. The first projects in the areas of factory transformation, green hydrogen and hydrogen storage are underway at the Hydrogen Campus, where companies, science and we as a city are working together. As recently as October, we were able to generate 1.5 million euros in state funding for the conversion of diesel shunting locomotives to hydrogen at Alstom. A truly major project is underway at Salzgitter AG with SALCOS, i.e. low-carbon steel production. This year, the company finalized the plans for implementing the first expansion stage and received funding commitments from the state, federal government and EU. If we consider that eight million CO² are still being produced there today, which is around one percent of Germany's total CO² emissions, and that only five percent of the original CO² emissions will remain at the end of 2033 according to the plans, this is an enormous step towards a climate-friendly future for Salzgitter. Volkswagen AG is currently implementing a similar large-scale project at the Salzgitter-Beddingen site: The foundation stone for the Group's first battery cell factory was laid there on July 7. The new factory is expected to create 5,000 future-proof jobs by 2025. You can see and feel the transformation of our automotive industry on this huge construction site - and it starts in our city. Both major projects and the numerous promising projects on the Hydrogen Campus make me very proud and give me confidence that our city will still be one of the most important industrial locations in Lower Saxony in 20 years' time. A vision is slowly becoming reality!
Incidentally, the long-planned construction of the new St. Elisabeth Hospital in Salzgitter-Bad is also becoming a reality. Back in 2018, the state of Lower Saxony confirmed funding for the new replacement building for our hospital in the south of the city. The planning has now been completed and the ground-breaking ceremony took place on October 10 this year. We will all benefit from this.
Dear fellow citizens,
I found it very positive that we were able to meet again - no matter how well all the digital ways of staying in touch worked, they are no substitute for meeting in person. I'm sure you missed this as much as I did.
Cultural life also flourished. There was another Kultursommer, a Klesmer festival, the Motorradgedenkfahrt, the Senior Citizens' Day and many other social events in our city. There was life on the streets again and that gives me hope for 2023.
Christmas is the festival of love, charity and contemplation. Even if the time may seem very dark at the moment, not only because of the short days, please use the festive season to give your relatives, friends and even strangers a little joy. A smile, a nice gesture or a small surprise can go a long way. Confucius already knew this when he once said: "It is better to light a single small light than to curse the darkness."
So let's light lots of little lights, then Christmas will be bright and friendly in our city.
I wish you a wonderful and blessed Christmas and all the best for the New Year! Let us hope together for an early end to war and violence in Ukraine and around the world.
"May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Spirit." (Romans 15:13)
Yours
Frank Klingebiel