Since December, our krea[K]tiv member Sabine Hartmannshenn has been on the cultural committee of the city of Cologne for the party „Volt“.
Volt is a young party that was founded in Amsterdam in 2016 and was able to win a seat in the European Parliament in 2019 from a standing start. In addition to the urgent issues of environment, transport, and digitalization, Volt is concerned with the closer networking of European states. Following the best practice principle, they strive for synergies at the European level in the different areas.
These are the interfaces that led our member Sabine, in view of our Krea[K]tiv goals, to become involved in this party in her hometown of Cologne since December 2020.
krea[K]tiv wants to build up a lobby in politics and network on a European level. That’s where Volt offers the ideal starting point. Volt competed for the first time in the local elections in Cologne 2020 and was able to win 4 mandates right away. At the moment, coalition negotiations are still underway with the Greens and the CDU, in which Sabine is involved as an SE (resident expert). If these should run to the satisfaction of the Volter, they would be in government responsibility in Cologne! A challenging task for the newcomer, but a huge opportunity to steer politics in a different direction.
Sabine sees herself as a bridge-builder between art and politics. Her main concerns are active design in the sense of krea[K]tiv and being a mouthpiece for us in politics.
She would like to inform her political colleagues firsthand about the grievances in music theatre.
At the moment, she is fighting to ensure that the cultural budget does not shrink as has already been announced in other cities. In addition, she is going even further: In Cologne, she and Volt are calling for a gradual 5% increase in the cultural budget. Whether she succeeds in this bold undertaking in these times, she will report on progress and also on how the other parties position themselves in this regard. There are federal and some state elections this year. Volt is running in the federal election. Maybe this will help you in your election decision!
