Erding mayor Max Gotz elected Bavarian municipalities association president

Max Gotz, the mayor of Erding, has been elected president of the Bavarian Municipal Association, succeeding Uwe Brandl after 24 years in the role, BR reports. Gotz received all the votes at the association’s state assembly in Freising.

The association represents more than 2,000 municipalities, market towns and cities in Bavaria that belong to administrative districts.

Gotz, who recently turned 63 and, like Brandl, is a member of the CSU, has worked in local politics for decades. He has been Erding’s first mayor since 2008 and its mayor since January 2013. The city has 38,000 residents and lies within Munich’s S-Bahn network.

“We are the all-round provider for the common good. We hold society together locally,” Gotz said. He said people experienced a functioning community most directly at the local level and called for towns and municipalities to be strengthened. He said he would soon seek talks with the federal and state governments, adding that the federal government was currently the main address because of what he called excessive social costs.

Brandl, who was mayor of Abensberg from 1993 to 2023, became association president in 2002. He also served for several years as president of the German Association of Towns and Municipalities. The association named him an honorary president in recognition of his commitment to local self-government and the organization.