Ærøskøbing Municipality (, ) is a former municipality of Funen County on the island of

Ærø Ærø () is one of the Denmark, Danish Baltic Sea islands, and part of the Region of Southern Denmark, Southern Denmark Region. Since 1 January 2006 all of Ærø has constituted a single Municipalities of Denmark, municipality, known as Ærø M ...

. The municipality was formed in 1970 and disestablished in 2006 when it was integrated into Ærø Municipality. The municipality was located on the western portion of the island of Ærø. Its neighboring municipality Marstal occupied the eastern portion of the island. To the north and west are the waters of the

Little Belt The Little Belt (, ) is a strait between the island of Funen and the Jutland Peninsula in Denmark. It is one of the three Danish straits, Danish Straits that drain and connect the Baltic Sea to the Kattegat strait, which drains west to the Nor ...

. To the south is the

Baltic Sea The Baltic Sea is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by the countries of Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden, and the North European Plain, North and Central European Plain regions. It is the ...

, and to the southeast are the waters of Marstal Bay (''Marstal Bugt'').

History

Before the municipality was established, the administrative region was originally named West-Æro Municipality (Danish:''Vest-Æro Kommune''), and . Following the

1970 Danish Municipal Reform The 1970 Danish Municipal Reform was an extensive administrative reform in Denmark which on 1 April 1970 reduced the number of Danish municipalities from 1,098 to 277 and the number of counties from 25 to 14. The reform also abolished the last le ...

, it was given its official name. The municipality covered an area of 74 km², and had a total population of 3,731 (2005). The town of

Ærøskøbing Ærøskøbing () is a town on the island of Ærø, Denmark. The suffix -købing means a trade town in the languages that derive from Old Norse. Ærøskøbing's houses and streets are delicately restored to retain the character of the olden days ...

served as the seat of its municipal council. On 1 January 2006 Ærøskøbing Municipality ceased to exist as the result of ''Kommunalreformen'' ("The Municipal Reform" of 2007), when Ærøskøbing merged with Marstal municipality and formed the new Ærø municipality. The result was a municipality with an area of 91 km² and a total population of 6,939 (2005). The new municipality became part of the

Region of Southern Denmark The Region of Southern Denmark (, ; , ; ) is an administrative region of Denmark established on Monday 1 January 2007 as part of the 2007 Danish Municipal Reform, which abolished the traditional counties ("amter") and set up five larger regions ...

. Its last mayor, Jørgen Otto Jørgensen, was a member of the

Social Democrats Social democracy is a social, economic, and political philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy and a gradualist, reformist, and democratic approach toward achieving social equality. In modern practice, s ...

party. He became the mayor of the newly formed Ærø municipality, an office he held twice, from 2006 until 2010 and again from 2014 to 2017.

Mayors

* Helge J. Hansen, 1970–1981 * Kasper Caspersen, 1982–1985 * Jens Groth–Lauritsen, 1986–1997 * Jørgen Otto Jørgensen, 1998–2005

External links

Ærø island tourist bureau

References

Former municipalities of Denmark {{SouthernDK-stub