Refugee accommodation in Dresden: What comes after the containers?

Just no gymnasiums: Municipalities spend a lot of money to accommodate refugees. Residential containers are intended to create space and social peace – also in Dresden. But the city has had enough of short-term solutions.

From Sachsenplatz in Dresden it is only a fifteen-minute walk to the famous old town, always along the Elbe. Barracks stood here until the night of the bombing in 1945. Today the meadow serves as a parking lot for a nursing home and a row of ten-story buildings. A notice from the housing association recently hung in the hallway: The parking lot could be turned into refugee accommodation.

The city wants to build 152 spaces, primarily for single travelers, by the summer – 36 residential containers in rows of two times four. Toilet, bathroom and kitchen are extra. Costs for two years: estimated 6.7 million euros. Such container accommodations are currently being planned and built across Germany, on the outskirts of commercial areas or in ports, more rarely in residential areas such as Sachsenplatz. The city of Dresden has selected nine locations to provide care for over 800 people.

“Already more than 2015”

“In fact, there is no location that is uncritical,” says Stephan Kühn, the construction officer. Half a year ago, his administration began “grazing” all urban areas. After extensive testing, the selection was not large. There is a lack of free space and nothing else will be built at the nine locations, at least for the next two years, says the Green politician.

The first container accommodation, which has already been decided, is to go into operation in the spring. At the same time, the city is continuing to try to rent hotels and develop new properties. Around 300 places have already been created at short notice in an event hall and a building of the former VEB Kombinat Robotron. An emergency shelter in the exhibition center could be dismantled for this purpose. Several hundred places are rented in hotels. But all that is not enough.

1600 asylum seekers were assigned to Dresden in 2022 by the state. The city expects 2,200 this year. People from Ukraine are not included. There are already more arrivals “than in the years 2015 to ’17,” says Kühn. Most arrivals only take place in autumn. The containers are therefore the only way to create capacity in good time – and not to have to occupy gyms. Tent accommodation is also not an option.

Cost of 47 million euros

For the “mobile room units”, as the city calls the containers, it is planning costs of 47 million euros spread over two years. Eleven million euros are spent on renting, planning and building the containers, and security guards cost 19 million euros. Funding has yet to be found for much of the money. According to the law, the Free State of Saxony should later take over 90 percent of it. The per capita costs are still almost three times as high as the flat rate that Saxony is currently paying out.

According to social affairs officer Kristin Kaufmann, temporary accommodation is the most expensive in the long term, while accommodation in apartments is the cheapest. Only you have neither the time nor the apartments, so the left-wing politician.

A single large container accommodation for hundreds of people, as they are currently around caused heated discussions in Upahl, Mecklenburg-West Pomerania, was deliberately not planned. Dresden’s city council had already decided in 2017 to only set up accommodation for a maximum of 65 people. In order to ensure integration on site, but also for “a minimum level of privacy, protection and retreat” for the residents, says Kaufmann. The fact that some locations such as Sachsenplatz are now becoming larger is due to the overall situation.

Kaufmann is nevertheless certain that the support will be successful. “We’re not rookies,” she says. Every refugee is accompanied in Dresden according to their needs and in their mother tongue. “Our migration social workers help when it comes to language, education or a daycare or school place.” At the same time, they would convey values ​​and norms and act as networkers for the refugees. At least the shortage of staff that other municipalities complain about does not exist in Dresden, according to the city administration.

“Don’t want to repeat mistakes”

But the container buildings are plan B for a plan A that is still unfinished: Kristin Kaufmann and Stephan Kühn want to create permanent accommodation in Dresden.

Such standby capacities should have been built up after 2015/16, says Kühn. But back then there was neither money from the federal and state governments, nor the foresight that immigration would remain high in the long term. “We don’t want to repeat this mistake,” says Kühn. Four buildings in the city are to be “completely renovated”. Cost in two cases: six to seven million euros each. “So far, I have zero euros in the budget for this,” says Kühn.

The sociologist Özgür Özvatan welcomes such considerations. So far, when dealing with refugee migration, there have been “many ad hoc attempts at regulation, but no long-term program,” says the researcher from the Berlin Institute for Empirical Integration and Migration Research. Even accommodation in container buildings is difficult from a humanitarian point of view, but given the current housing shortage, “in many places it appears to be temporarily pragmatic,” says Özvatan.

One argument against alternatives such as emergency accommodation in gyms is that these are often seen as “realistic examples of new people coming and taking over infrastructure”. This is symbolically charged and can trigger “problem-centered competitive dynamics” locally. Özvatan emphasizes that there has been a dramatic increase in attacks on emergency shelters in recent years. would be added Threats to local politicians.

Similar considerations as in Dresden had recently been expressed by the district administrator of the Mittelsachsen district, Dirk Neubauer. Both municipalities are hoping for support from higher levels. At the Saxon Ministry of the Interior, they are not rushing in with open doors. The ministry faces tagesschau.de no additional help in prospect. On the contrary: Because use for other purposes is also under discussion for years with lower immigration figures, it must be examined to what extent the projects would be reflected in the existing “flat-rate accounting system”.

You still have an idea where the money could come from. Saxony is one of the federal states that so far has hardly benefited or not at all from vacant federal properties. Federal Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser has repeatedly promised the municipalities and states as accommodation. If this still does not exist, writes the Saxon Ministry of the Interior, one expects “an appropriate share of the financial contribution from the federal government”, i.e. more money, which the ministry writes could then be used to create permanent capacities.

“Not a question of if, but of how”

But that’s music for the future. And so Kristin Kaufmann is starting a tour through Dresden these days to present the container plans. At the end of March there is to be a large civil dialogue. Then it goes to the district councils. The city council is due to make a final decision in May. Even if the containers are already in place, open house days should take place first.

Dresden’s CDU parliamentary group considers many of the nine locations unsuitable. And it goes even further: the current asylum policy must be ended. “No! We don’t have the capacity!” It says in a position paper. In the city council, the parliamentary group represents eleven of the 70 deputies.

The right-wing extremists “Free Saxony” are already mobilizing against the alleged “asylum madness” – so far with moderate success. However, a security concept is currently being developed for the votes in the city districts.

Kristin Kaufmann expects difficult discussions. “We are encountering resentment from our citizens, who have fears and doubts that we can succeed,” she says. Since Ukrainians have also been fleeing, the schools have been full. But the question is not whether to accommodate refugees, but how.

Kaufmann hopes for understanding and support and that people weigh up the alternatives. The sword of Damocles called Gymnasium hovers over any location that is not enforced. And that would then be eliminated for school or club sports. “You have to say it so bluntly at this point,” says Kaufmann.