Peter Benz

Peter Benz (* 10. September 1942 in Darmstadt ) is a German politician of the SPD . He was Lord Mayor of Darmstadt from 1993 to 2005 .

education and profession

Peter Benz attended elementary school in Darmstadt-Arheilgen and graduated from Georg Büchner School in 1963 .

After studying German language and literature , political science , philosophy and sociology in Frankfurt am Main , Benz began teaching at the Justus Liebig School in Darmstadt in 1970, and then at the Bertolt Brecht School in Darmstadt from 1974 . Among other things, he was jointly responsible for the naming of the Bertolt Brecht School in the planning group for the upper secondary school. In 1974 he was elected as a member of the Hessian state parliament. There he was a member of the Interior Committee and the Cultural Policy Committee. In 1976 Peter Benz was elected to the city council as head of the school, youth and sport department. In 1983 he was elected mayor of Darmstadt. He held this office until his election as the first directly elected Lord Mayor of a Hessian city in 1993. In 1999 he was re-elected for a further six years.

politics

From 1 December 1974 to office as City Council on 8 December 1976, he served as for the constituency of Darmstadt City Iowa directly elected representative member of the Hessian Parliament . In 1976 he became a full-time city ​​councilor in his hometown of Darmstadt.

As the first directly elected Lord Mayor of Hesse , he succeeded Günther Metzger in office. Benz did not run for the 2005 election; Walter Hoffmann was his successor . Before and during his tenure as Lord Mayor, Benz was active in various functions in Hessian local politics for decades, finally as President of the Hessian City Council (1997-1999).

literature

• Jochen Lengemann : The Hessen Parliament 1946–1986 . Biographical handbook of the advisory state committee, the state assembly advising the constitution and the Hessian state parliament (1st – 11th electoral period). Ed .: President of the Hessian State Parliament. Insel-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1986, ISBN 3-458-14330-0 , p. 209 ( hessen.de [PDF; 12.4 MB ]).
• Jochen Lengemann : MdL Hessen. 1808-1996. Biographical index (= political and parliamentary history of the state of Hesse. Vol. 14 = publications of the Historical Commission for Hesse. Vol. 48, 7). Elwert, Marburg 1996, ISBN 3-7708-1071-6 , p. 70.
• Politics for Darmstadt. Peter Benz and his time (Ed. Martin Frenzel)