NEIGHBOURS' DAY 2010

2010 marks the 10th anniversary of Neighbours  Day, since it was launched in Paris, in 2000. This year, Neighbours' Day will be celebrated on Friday 28th May.  A large of number of towns, cities and housing associations will mark the day in most European Member States.

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VISIT TO BULGARIA

In the weekend of July 17-19th, 2009, I, as president of our Charter, made together with Helma van Drunen, a short trip to Bulgaria to meet 8 mayors of the municipality of Maglish in the centre of Bulgaria.

We arrived Friday in the afternoon at the airport of Sofia and there we met Nelly Demireva, the translator, together with Dimka Neykova, secretary of the municipality of Maglish and  Dimitar Dimitrov, mayor of Yagoda (one of the villages of Maglish) They drove us to Maglish, where the mayor, mr Stoicho Tcanev received us.

During the car ride of more than three hours, we had the possibility to tell Dimka and Dimitar about the organisation of our Charter and about our aims.

On Saturday we visited 7 other villages of the municipality and we met all the mayors. With all of them we had a short interview and a discussion about the possibilities of our Charter. Most of them were really interested.

We agreed that the villages of Maglish will receive an official invitation to come with 5 persons to our small meeting about local democracy in Kolindros in September. There they can experience what the Charter is doing and they can introduce themselves.

After that meeting they will decide whether they want to join the Charter or not.

In the summer meeting of 2010 the mayors meeting of the Charter then will officially decide about the membership.

On the photos you can see a small impression of our visit.

Frans Ronnes,
president.