Thanks, Halldór Árni!

Historic meetings of the Hafnarfjörður Town Council

For the last four decades, the broadcasting and streaming of Hafnarfjörður Town Council meetings has been in the hands of the versatile Halldór Árni Sveinsson, editor and owner of netamfelag.is. Halldór Árni streamed his last meeting on Wednesday, 20th December, and today, Wednesday, 17th January, is the first streaming meeting for the Hafnarfjörður-based company RecMedia, which has taken over. Borough Council meetings are held fortnightly on Wednesdays at 2 p.m. at Hafnarborg.

Thank you for your cooperation and the good work for the benefit of the municipality.

At the last meeting of the Hafnarfjörður town council in 2023, which was also Halldór Árni's last, he was given sincere and heartfelt thanks for his collaboration, dedication, and the excellent work he has done over the past decades. The thanks were conveyed by both Kristinn Andersen, the Mayor of the Town Council, and Rósa Guðbjartsdóttir, the Mayor, as Halldór Árni has attended more meetings than any other town councillor or resident in Hafnarfjörður.

Halldór Árni's journey for the City of Hafnarfjörður began around 40 years ago on the city's 75th anniversary, where he was in charge of the first Hafnarfjörður radio broadcast and Halldór Árni received the fourth licence issued in Iceland for radio broadcasting after the state's monopolybroadcasting was abolished. The broadcast became the spark for what would later become Radio Hafnarfjörður. The first broadcast of a town council meeting was in early 1988, when the budget for the financial year was approved. Regular broadcasts of town council meetings on the radio began a year later, and it is safe to say that this increased media coverage and new connection with the town's residents marked a turning point in the history of the municipality, bringing coverage of current affairs closer to the people of Hafnarfjörður. Radio broadcasts continued until the turn of the century, when even further development and experiments with live video streaming from Hafnarborg began, courtesy of Halldór Árni and his students in the media department of Flensborg School.

At home in Hafnarfjörður with Heim in Hafnarfjörður

Halldór Árni is a man of many talents and has, in various ways, both left his mark on the town life of Hafnarfjörður and documented it. Halldór Árni has usually been the first person on the scene at various celebrations and festivities, and he has left behind a large and extensive collection of words and pictures documenting the historical events of Hafnarfjörður and the town of Hafnarfjörður. Halldór Árni is a trained visual artist and commercial artist, and he has participated in group exhibitions and held numerous painting exhibitions, most recently in April 2023 at the Litla Gallerí on Strandgata. That exhibition was titled 'Home to Hafnarfjörður'.

Thank you, Halldór Árni, for your selfless, invaluable and professional contribution to the coverage and documentation of the life and affairs of our town. Above all, thank you for your collaboration and friendship.