“Housing Crisis” – Asylum: Tents are now also being set up in the West

According to information available to APA, tents will be set up in a police building in Absam-Gnadenwald on Thursday, or it will be Feldkirch-Gisingen’s turn on the same day or Friday at the latest. It is not yet clear how many emergency shelters there will be. The Federal Care Agency (BBU) is responsible for the assessment. Because both Tirol and Vorarlberg have recently agreed to place containers.

However, both Tyrol and Vorarlberg are far below the requirements when it comes to meeting quotas. The same goes for Carinthia, where there are already five tents each in Klagenfurt and Villach. The largest uprising against this solution to date has taken place in Upper Austria, where 13 tents are erected on the grounds of Thalham’s first shelter. Local politicians are even considering a highway blockade on National Day. However, on Wednesday the tents on the site were moved from the adjacent buildings.

Aid organizations: ‘Not a refugee crisis, but a housing crisis’
In the meantime, leading aid organizations have opposed the tent solution in an open letter to the Chancellor, Minister of the Interior, Minister of Finance and Minister of Integration: “Nobody wants that and this inhumane housing is also absolutely avoidable,” said Caritas, among others. Diakonie, Red Cross, Asylum Coordination and Volkshilfe signed the letter. It also stressed that this was “not a refugee crisis, but a housing crisis”.

Despite multiple warnings, including from aid agencies, there was a bottleneck and the federal government’s basic supply districts would be overloaded: “It’s high time to get rid of this problem.” Ministry of the Interior should invite for a housing as soon as possible.