MAYOR of Derry City and Strabane District Council, Alderman Graham Warke, faced some hard-hitting questions from local primary school pupils this week as part of the Promoting Local Democracy initiative.
The initiative has several elements, including meet the City and District’s No.1 Citizen, Councillors Go Back to School, and online debates where schools can debate with the Mayor and elected members on a topic of their choice.
As part of Councillors Go Back to School, Mayor Warke paid a visit to St Columba’s Primary School in Newbuildings alongside fellow elected members Alderman Ryan McCready and Cllr Rachael Ferguson on Wednesday.
And on Thursday the Mayor visited St Anne’s Primary School in Rosemount where he discussed his role as First Citizen and revealed more about what being a councillor entails.
The initiative is aimed at raising young people’s awareness of how local councils operate, informing them about opportunities for taking part in local decision-making, and drawing their attention to how their involvement in local affairs is crucial in upholding local democracy.
Normally council would host a Local Democracy Week where school children visit the Guildhall, meet the mayor and local councillors, and learn more about how the council operates.
But due to COVID-19 guidelines the event is unable to take place this year, therefore, schools have been offered the opportunity to have the Mayor and elected members visit physically or virtually.
Mayor Warke said it was a great to meet local young people, to hear their views on what matters to them, and to share more about why their role in democracy is so important.
“I really enjoyed my visit to St Columba’s PS and to St Anne’s PS this week and I’m looking forward to meeting more young people as part of the Promoting Local Democracy initiative.
“They are our future and their views on what matters to them and what they think we need to be doing differently are extremely important.
“For my fellow councillors and I, we want to make decisions that make the future better and brighter for these young people and it is only right that they have a say in what that future looks like.
“They had a lot of interesting and inquisitive questions about what it means to be the mayor of this district, and I hope I may even have met a few future mayors in the making.”
To find out more visit: https://www.derrystrabane.com/localdemweek
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