BRK has new district manager

Created: 05/27/2022, 06:00

By: Hans Moritz

The new head of the BRK district association: the future district manager Andreas Lindner (left) and chairman Jürgen Loher.

© Hans Moritz

The district association Erding in the Bavarian Red Cross (BRK) has set the final course to get back into calm waters after months of turbulence.

Erding - After the board election, which was rich in trials and tribulations, in which Jürgen Loher took over the chairmanship, there is now a new district manager.

And it comes from our own ranks.

Andreas Lindner will take over the business on August 1st.

The 52-year-old is currently acting as deputy chairman.

The two vice positions are to be filled at the next regular general meeting on September 16th.

Lindner succeeds Gisela van der Heijden, who came to the BRK as district manager in 2012, but has not been on duty for a good year (we reported).

She was represented during this time by her deputy Albert Thurner.

He did a lot together with Loher to reunite the district association.

Lindner wants to continue on this course.

“I stand for maximum transparency – both internally and externally.

It is important to me to bring the main and voluntary work back together so that we form a unit and help each other," announces the father of two adult sons who lives in Erding.

Lindner takes over by far the largest social organization in the district.

It has almost 12,000 sponsors, 210 full-time and 1,100 volunteers.

In the vaccination center alone, with two mobile teams and the vaccination bus, the BRK employs 30 people.

Loher reports that 50 people have applied to succeed van der Heijden, some from business, other district associations, but also from their own.

Lindner, who trained as a toolmaker and advertising salesman and worked in sales for many years in a publishing house and at the internet service provider GMX, admits: "I didn't even see myself in this role at first.

I decided to apply after I was approached more and more by colleagues from the BRK, but also from other aid organizations.” At 52, he is now daring to start a new career.

And promises: "It will probably be my last professional station, I see my task as long-term."

The job may be new, but Lindner knows the BRK very well, for over 40 years.

In 1980, at the age of ten, he went to the youth Red Cross, five years later he also joined the water rescue service.

He worked as a group leader for 15 years, was first a youth director at the Erding water rescue service and then deputy local chairman.

In 1998 he was appointed to the budget committee of the district association, so he also knows the business side of the BRK.

In 2017, the general meeting elected him second deputy district chairman, and in 2021 Lindner was confirmed in office.

In addition, he has acted as crisis manager for two years, should a disaster be declared.

He also has (corona) experience here.

Loher explains that the ideal managing director has been found.

“We need someone who knows their stuff and can help quickly.

The BRK has recently grown significantly in terms of its tasks.

That's why we don't need a highly creative mind at the moment, but someone who brings people together and gives the members and employees a free hand." His impression after the transition phase: "Working together is working again - on the basis of self-organization." The BRK is finally there, where it belongs – in the middle of society.

It is now important to focus on the core competence of the BRK - "being there for people in the most varied of circumstances," says Loher.

Lindner, meanwhile, is happy “that I can now turn my hobby into a job.

It doesn't get any rounder."

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