In conversation with Andreas Seitz, the municipal clerk of Visp

I see the municipality of Visp as a very dynamic little town. In recent years, Lonza AG has hired several thousand new employees at the Visp site. At the same time, the company has invested billions in its plant. This has brought many challenges for the municipality of Visp. However, it also offers great opportunities for Visp. This has led to a very dynamic process in which the municipality of Visp is taking on an increasingly urban face and is also increasingly confronted with typical urban issues such as mobility planning. Specifically, the population and the proportion of residents of foreign origin are rising steadily. Despite the "building boom", this is leading to a high demand for living space, daycare places, parking spaces, etc.

On the one hand, the municipal infrastructure had to be constantly developed and in some cases expanded. On the other hand, with more and often well-qualified residents and new companies settling in Visp, the municipality's income also increases. Visp, a municipality that has always been open to the world, is being enriched by people from other cultural backgrounds. There is now an opportunity, based on comprehensive planning, to lead the development of the municipality into the future in a positive sense. In any case, these are very diverse and exciting tasks, especially for a municipality.

The population of all three municipalities approved the merger to form the new municipality of "Visp" on January 1, 2027. For me personally, the move to merge meant, on the one hand, the opportunity to continue along the path of cooperation already taken between the three municipalities even more consistently. The residents of the municipalities of Visp, Baltschieder and Eggerberg can benefit from a well-positioned administration.

The municipal software is an important "piece of the puzzle" in the further development of the municipality and in the implementation of mergers. We are fortunate that all three municipalities are already working with Swiss Post Digital Government software until the vote on 26.11.2023 - this made it much easier to integrate the data from the three municipalities.

In general, the ongoing digitalization of the administration presents challenges for all municipalities. However, in my opinion, the ever-growing number of municipal tasks can only be managed through consistent digitalization. Software therefore has a correspondingly high priority.

It is indeed reassuring to know that Swiss Post Digital Government has extensive experience in merger projects. This experience and also the knowledge of "stumbling blocks" in such central projects gave us a good feeling.