On October 30 th and 31 st 2019 Tomislav Jarmić. Coordinator of the AAA´s TCP on Disaster Prevention moderated a workshop which was organized within the framework of the project
»RESPONSE Resilience Officer for Social Emergencies« in Varaždin. This project is co-financed by the European Union via the program “Erasmus+ – KA2 Knowledge Alliances”.
The aim of the project is to develop a curriculum focusing on training young volunteers that assist affected persons during and after major disasters and catastrophes.

Varaždin County is participating in the project as a partner. The partnership includes organizations from Italy, Spain, Greece, the Netherlands and Bulgaria. The lead partner is CSL LA CREMERIA, a vocational education institution from the Municipality of Cavriago in Reggio Emilia, Italy.

The main focus of the project is to develop a curriculum for the training of volunteers taking part in crisis situations. Each partner will elaborate specific content for the curriculum. Each workshop will analyze the curriculum developed / proposed so far and will discuss the role of volunteering in the crisis management process, leading to concrete conclusions on improving solidarity in times of crisis and how to better involve citizens in volunteering activities and possible scenarios. Volunteering is considered a fundamental element of solidarity in times of crisis and will be encouraged. This is significant at both the local and European level. For this reason, the issue of volunteerism will be the topic of all workshop discussions. Examples of best practices for volunteer involvement will be presented during the training.

All workshops will be conducted with the input, opinion and expertise of transnational project partners. The results of all workshops will be summarized at the final conference of the project.
The workshop was attended by representatives of the Red Cross Society of Varaždin County, the City Red Cross Society of the City of Varaždin, the Institute for Emergency Medicine of Varaždin County, the Varaždin Police Department, the Varaždin County Civil Protection Office, the Mountain Rescue Service, Varaždin County Station for civil protection and representatives of the Varaždin County Civil Service.

In the framework of the Europe for Citizens-project „CROWD II“, which was supported by the AAA, „CROWD_topia“ will be an international workshop for the independent-literature-community at “Forum Stadtpark” in Graz on November 8th and 9th 2019. Authors like Kinga Tóth, Nikos Zachariadis, Vladimir Arsenijevic, Tom Bresemann, Max Höfler and others will tackle the big question „How do we want to live together?“ and try to find an artistic approach to the not yet existing European Constitution. The results of the workshop will be presented to the interested public on November 8th at 18:00 at „Forum Stadtpark“.
For further information visit www.crowd-literature.eu

Culture, renewable energies and educational co-operation were the topics of a recent
meeting between Burgenland´s Governor Hans Peter Doskozil and the Chairman of the Alps-
Adriatic Concil, Varaždin County´s Prefect Radimir Čačić in in Eisenstadt.

As members of the Alps-Adriatic Alliance it is important for us, to use this opportunity to
exchange views and benefit from each others know-how, in order to initiate new
collaborations, declared Governor Hans Peter Doskozil.

Both regions are founding members of the Alps-Adriatic Alliance (AAA) and, accordingly, the
mutual desire for future cooperation is big: Discussion topics included culture and cultural
enterprises in Burgenland, the pioneering role of Burgenland in renewable energies as well
as education and existing and planned cooperation in higher education – such as a
partnership between the University of Applied Sciences (Fachhochschule) Pinkafeld and the
University of Sjever (i.e. Northern Croatia) which has campuses in Varaždin and Koprivnica.

Picture Underline:
(from left to right) Prefect Radimir Čačić, his deputy Tomislav Paljak, Governor Hans Peter
Doskozil and Regional Minister Christian Illedits
© Bgld. Landesmedienservice

On Friday September 20th 2019 Mayor Dr. Aleksander Jevšek of Murska Sobota/SLO who is
currently presiding over Skupnost Občin Slovenije (SOS) – the Association of Municipalities
and Towns of Slovenia was visited by Thomas Pseiner, Secretary General of the Alps-
Adriatic-Alliance (AAA).

SOS represents Slovenia within the AAA-network and in the course of the meeting Dr.
Jevšek expressed the importance of the new strategy “SAA 2027” and his hope for even
bigger Alps-Adriatic-projects in the future. The mayor has also met the current president of
the AAA, Prefect Radimir Čačić of Varaždin County/CRO just recently, with whom he agrees
on the installation of an Alps-Adriatic NGO which is intended to prepare and implement such
bigger scale-projects in order to support the strategy. To foster the realization of such
projects, President Jevšek offered Murska Sobota to become the venue of an “Alps-Adriatic
Project Conference” in 2020, where concrete ideas should be developed. Challenges like
demographic or climate change affect all members of the AAA just the same. Therefore the
mayor expects no shortage in actual project initiatives.

Another very important topic of the meeting was the ongoing process of a possible
regionalization of the Republic of Slovenia. In comparison to all other AAA-members
Slovenia such an administrative level does not exist so far, beside the national ministries and
the municipalities. Mayor Dr. Jevšek, who is also a member of the Committee of the Regions
(CoR) has high expectations form this initiative, because it would finally make the Alps-
Adriatic truly part of a “Europe of Regions”.

Photo: © SOS

Enjoy a “Literature Excursion” to Ptuj/Slovenia, where “Poetry and Wine meets Alps-Adriatic” from Friday August 23^rd to Sunday August 25^th 2019. During this year´s “Days of Poetry and Wine” you will enjoy readings, performances, concerts and some wonderful wine tasting AND get the chance for networking and exchange of information at the Alps-Adriatic-Alliance Meeting on Saturday August 24^th , 14:00 at the “muzikafe” (next to the main stage at Jadranska Ulica 5 in Ptuj). The excursion is part of the AAA-project “Alps-Adriatic meets Nordic Streets”.

For detailed information in German please click http://www.styriansummerart.at/blog/literatur-exkursion-slowenien-poetry-and-wine-alps-adriatic/