Head of Department

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Dezernent (Latin decernens "decisive", "determining") is a functional designation in the public service in Germany .

State and federal level

At the state and federal level, department head is the designation for a civil servant or employee of the higher service who works in a middle or local authority and has independent decision-making powers there without being the head of an independent functional unit. These are in contrast as Dezernats -, department or agency head (or president , director), respectively. The department heads corresponds to top and top authorities of the speaker .

Municipalities

At the municipal level, the department head performs similar tasks as a federal minister at the federal level or a state minister at the state level . The head of department heads a specific business area, usually determined by the mayor, such as B. Central services, finance, social affairs or construction. In almost all federal states, the full-time department heads in cities and municipalities belong to the municipal or administrative board, in Hesse to the magistrate .

The exact official title of department head differs depending on the state and function. The title is partly alderman (e.g. in North Rhine-Westphalia or Hesse), partly city ​​councilor or professional city councilor (as a difference to the local parliament , e.g. in Bavaria or Lower Saxony). In some cases, both names are used at the same time (e.g. in large cities in North Rhine-Westphalia and Hesse). According to the municipal constitution of Baden-Württemberg , the department heads of a city use the official designation "mayor" to distinguish it from the mayor . The head of department representing the mayor bears the official title of “First Mayor” in Baden-Württemberg and “First City Councilor” in Lower Saxony. In Lübeck and some Hanseatic cities of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, such as Rostock, the department heads use the official designation " Senator ". In Bavaria, department heads are also referred to as speakers. Depending on the subject area assigned, department heads sometimes also have special names such as city treasurer, building city councilor, financial officer or social senator.

As a rule, department heads are municipal electoral officers who are elected by the respective municipal parliament of a city or municipality. In special cases (e.g. in Lower Saxony), however, only a candidate proposed by the (Lord) Mayor can be confirmed or rejected. In most federal states, the term of office of the department heads is eight years by election and is therefore longer in the majority of the federal states than the electoral term of the (mayors), who are mostly directly elected by the people, as heads of administration.

The exact responsibility and number of department heads of a municipality varies depending on the federal state due to different municipal constitution models. Furthermore, the municipalities have the possibility of creating more or fewer departments within the framework of the organizational and personnel sovereignty of the municipal self-government. This is usually decided by the local parliaments in consultation with the (mayor) by changing the main statute . This can lead to cities in a federal state, despite a comparable population size, having a different number and structure of department heads and corresponding department heads that take local peculiarities or political majority constellations into account.

At the district level , the activities and election of department heads are usually comparable to those in the municipalities. They, too, are mostly municipal electoral officers on a temporary basis and as full-time executives in the district administration.