Action alliance against housing shortage and urban degradation, newsletter 123
Rally against housing shortage and forced evictions
In order to continue to make public in the urban society that the abolition of homelessness does not have to be a long-term matter, we will again stand in front of the house with the 80 vacant apartments in Friedrich-Engels-Strasse 7 on Saturday, February 4, starting at 11 a.m. But we will not stop there. Every Saturday we want to protest in front of another vacancy and demand the seizure and housing of homeless people. In Cologne, more than 5000 apartments are vacant.
The Action Alliance against Housing Shortage and Urban Destruction is also calling for a protest rally before the first council meeting this year.
Thursday, February 9, 2023, 2 p.m. Theo-Burauen-Platz, City Hall.
Jacquelin Winands, who was evicted with her children from her apartment in Gremberghoven and is still not accommodated by the city in a suitable apartment, is not an isolated case.
Adnan Akyüz on January 29, 2023 in the Express:
“Ines Kerstin (41) moved from Cologne to Korschenbroich in the Rhine district of Neuss in August 2020. “Because I couldn’t find an apartment in Cologne,” she explains. But she had to leave her apartment on Werner-von-Siemens-Strasse on January 12, 2023, because of an eviction. Since that day, she and her four children (3, 7, 15, 18) have been homeless.”
Korschenbroich and Mönchengladbach push the responsibility for the homeless Cologne woman with four children back and forth
https://www.express.de/koeln/nrw-koelnerin-nach-zwangsraeumung-im-kreis-neuss-obdachlos-423363
Anyone who wonders why it can be that the social administrations of the cities do not help first and foremost where a need is apparent is confronted with the financial plight of the cities.
In her book “Freiwillig zu Diensten” (Voluntarily at your service), Claudia Pinl has named reasons for this:
With the abolition of the property tax in 1997, from which they received shares, and the business capital tax in 1998, German municipalities lost reliable sources of revenue. The tax legislation of the past decades has made the rich richer, the middle class thinner and the state poorer.
In 2000, tax deductions for foundations were expanded. The public sector is foregoing substantial tax revenues, becoming poorer and poorer, so that the wealthy can decide for themselves how to spend their millions and billions – without democratic control. Accordingly, the foundation system is booming.
Pierre Bourdieu addressed the consequences of the abdication of the state in his book “The Misery of the World.” “In the interviews, the police officers, social workers and judges interviewed repeatedly express the feeling of being abandoned in their professional commitment against material and moral misery.” http://www.thomaslemkeweb.de/publikationen/rezensionen/Bourdieu.pdf
Instead of the cities standing up against the fact that a few are enriching themselves at the expense of many, that public infrastructure and cultural achievements are going down the drain because multimillionaires can’t get their hands full enough, they are competing against each other. Cologne is among them. Who falls by the wayside in the scramble for top spots is nowhere discussed.
Josef Berditchevski
In the Stadt-Anzeiger of February 3, 2023, Axel Spicker reports on p. 12 about the discontinuation of the investigation into the fatal shooting of street musician Josef Berditchevski. The lawyer of one of the police shooters is quoted: “The public prosecutor’s office has always led the two officers as witnesses and not as defendants, this circumstance alone proves that the actions of the police officers were correct.”
In contrast, Rainer Kippe in Circular 97, August 6, 2022:
“To take up arms because of the enforcement of PROPERTY RIGHTS is legally possible, but fundamentally contradicts our view of the right to life and physical integrity and of human dignity.
Therefore, this death shot cannot be legal.
There are other means to pacify social conflicts than firearms, the police should know that best.”
Https://www.wohnungsnot.koeln/rb97/
Counselor Bernd Müffeler explained in the Stadt-Anzeiger report, “It’s the system through which such psychologically conspicuous people fall.” For many of his 40 clients, he seeks psychiatric help in vain because the clinics are overloaded.
Psychiatric patients treated as inpatients are particularly often affected by homelessness, as a study at Berlin’s St. Hedwig Hospital showed.
https://www.medical-tribune.de/medizin-und-forschung/artikel/psychisch-krank-in-die-obdachlosigkeit/
Otto-Langen-Quartier: Interim solutions lose sight of the main solution
Paul Gross reported on February 1, 2023, in the Stadt-Anzeiger: City task force to enable rapid use of Otto-und-Langen-Quartier
https://www.ksta.de/koeln/muelheim/muelheim-veedel/koeln-muelheim-neue-nutzung-des-otto-und-langen-quartiers-moeglich-429655
Where is the quick use of the site for social and Housing First housing?
The Initiativkreis Otto Langen-Quartier comments:
The current reporting in the KStA refers to the demand for an interim use for the former KHD administration building on Deutz-Mülheimer-Strasse. “Interim use” is the current topic, but with which the actual topic of what is to become of the area is pushed into the background.
As is well known, the Otto-Langen-Quartier initiative group is committed to a community-oriented development of the old industrial site into a new urban quarter. This opportunity stands and falls with whether the City of Cologne and the State of North Rhine-Westphalia refrain from the bidding process for the site to a large investor at the highest bid, which was decided in 2021, and initiate an urban planning process for a community-oriented development.
To this end, we have made a proposal for action, which we presented at a press conference on December 7.
Initiativkreis Otto-Langen-Quartier
a working group of Rheinische Industriekultur e.V.
Jörg Frank (+49 151 58443416) / Bodo Marciniak (+49 221 691717) / Martin Stankowski (+49 163 5525262)
Vonovia
Under the headline “Vonovia stops 500 new buildings in Cologne,” the Kölnisch Rundschau reports:
“The city was in contact with potential and actual developers, it said, and was trying to shape the framework so that investors would stay on board and want to proceed.”
https://www.rundschau-online.de/koeln/koeln-vonovia-stoppt-500-neubauten-434839
Since one can also read in the same paper that GAG is building new apartments, the question arises as to why the media are not calling for GAG to be given a new 100% non-profit status and for it to be assisted by another municipal public welfare-oriented housing company.
https://www.rundschau-online.de/koeln/ehrenfeld/bickendorf/koeln-bickendorf-anwohner-kritisieren-baustelle-am-erlenweg-434272
To the reading
In February issue of the DRAUSSENSEITER Christina Bacher succeeded a prima interview with Kai Hauprich of the Vringstreff to Housing First. Finally a voice from the Cologne homeless aid that speaks tacheles:
Most homeless people want to live like everyone else.
The emergency shelters and services offered by the homeless aid are sometimes perceived as so threatening and damaging that they prefer the street,
We have become so socially accustomed to watching people die that we consider it normal. We can’t have that.
There are several reasons why social workers reject Housing First. One reason is loss of power.
One strength of Housing First is that it consistently asks what needs to be improved.
In Germany, we have really driven the housing market against the wall. As long as more housing is not created, nothing will fundamentally change.
Politicians and administrators must make it their goal to ensure that homelessness is no longer just managed, but overcome.
We keep individualizing social problems without tackling them at their structural roots.
Broadcasts, messages, news
From minute 10:35 WDR broadcast “market” from 2/1/2023.
Finally a home – HOUSING FIRST at the Association for Aid to the Endangered in Bonn
https://www1.wdr.de/fernsehen/markt/sendungen/uebersichtsseite-markt-2112-108.html
Scholz on expropriations: Berlin Greens and Leftists “irresponsible”
https://www.tagesspiegel.de/politik/kanzler-scholz-zu-enteignungen-berliner-grune-und-linke-unverantwortlich-9259092.html
Common good oriented land use from Tübingen perspective
https://www.boell.de/de/2023/01/24/kommunalpolitische-rahmenbedingungen-fuer-gemeinwohlorientierte-bodennutzung
Social preservation statutes for the Ehrenfeld-Ost area – residents’ survey begins
https://www.report-k.de/soziale-erhaltungssatzung-fuer-das-gebiet-ehrenfeld-ost-anwohnerbefragung-beginnt/
Vonovia housing group stops all planned new construction projects
It is becoming increasingly difficult to remedy the housing deficit. Now the real estate group Vonovia does not want to start new buildings planned for this year because of high construction costs. It would not be profitable at current rents. https://www.spiegel.de/wirtschaft/unternehmen/wohnungskonzern-vonovia-stoppt-alle-geplanten-neubauprojekte-a-028d72de-893b-4d95-bc90-038ee46b926b
Dates
06.02.2023, 19 o’clock, next meeting of right on city, old fire station, open meeting
06.02.2023, 19:30 o’clock, alliance meeting “enough is enough”, DGB house
09.02.2023, 14:00 Protest rally in front of the council, Theo-Burauen-Platz
14.02.2023, 17:00, Roncalli-Platz One Billion Rising Cologne: Worldwide day of action against violence against women* and girls* https://onebillionrising-koeln.de/
For a city without homelessness
For a city without evictions
For a city without drug deaths
For a city without violence against women and children
For a city without deportations
For a city without poverty
February 04, 2023
Klaus Jünschke and Rainer Kippe
https://wohnungsnot.koeln
PS
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