In Lörrach, tenants should leave 1950s apartments to make room for refugees. Now Mayor Lutz wants to speak. Can the head of the town hall help calm things down?
Lörrach (dpa/lsw) - In the debate about evictions for the creation of a refugee home in Lörrach, the SPD member of parliament Jonas Hoffmann pointed out the tense situation in the communities. The pressure on the municipalities to accommodate more and more people triggers "desperate measures", Hoffmann said in a video distributed on Tuesday. "This measure is probably one of them," added the deputy with a view to the announced step in the southern Baden city.
On Monday it became known that around 40 tenants were to move out of a residential complex to make room for refugees. Municipal housing in Lörrach was said to be offering tenants more modern and affordable housing. The announcement sparked debates on social media. Mayor Jörg Lutz (independent) and the managing director of Wohnbau Lörrach, Thomas Nostadt, want to report on details at a press conference called at short notice on Wednesday, as the city announced.
A refugee policy that does not control is "unfortunately social explosives," said CDU interior expert Philipp Amthor on the TV station Welt. The municipalities are overwhelmed with the accommodation of many refugees. Something like this happens not only in Lörrach, but also elsewhere, said Amthor. The AfD in the Baden-Württemberg state parliament announced that the case in Lörrach shows that struggles over the distribution of living space are already beginning. The FDP member of the Bundestag Ann-Veruschka Jurisch called for France to be persuaded to take in more refugees.
According to city information, the buildings are apartments from the 1950s. In any case, it was planned to demolish and rebuild it in the coming years because of its condition, the statement said. The affected tenants are to be informed on February 27 at a residents' meeting.
It is common practice to demolish buildings that can no longer be renovated, a spokeswoman for the Baden-Württemberg City Council told the German Press Agency. "In such cases, tenants must expect termination." If the tenants are then given individually suitable alternatives, this is a good signal. "It is currently unavoidable that the living space that is freed up as a result, but can only be used temporarily, is used to accommodate refugees. This shows how exhausted the accommodation capacities of the cities are," explained the spokeswoman.
The SPD parliamentarian Hoffmann brought up the possibility of allowing the municipalities to accommodate refugees in vacant apartments until there were other uses. There is a lack of living space in the country, he criticized.
