The story of an African, Syrian or Afghan refugee who has been in state accommodation in Ebersberg for years and is desperately looking for his own apartment or even just his own room should actually be at this point. Asked about the responsible departments, they say: Oh yes, we have a few examples. But nobody wants to talk about their situation – be it out of shame, be it out of fear, be it for other reasons.
The figures from the district office show that it is very difficult for many people who ended up in Ebersberg after fleeing to find their own accommodation: In 2017, 902 refugees were registered in public accommodation, 332 of them looking for one Apartment; all others had not yet achieved the status in the asylum procedure that they could look for their own place to stay. As of the beginning of December, 1,022 people were housed in community accommodation, containers or state-rented apartments in the district, of which 169 people were looking for their own apartment.
The Anzinger district and municipal councilor Reinhard Oellerer has been helping refugees for years, among other things, with finding accommodation.
(Photo: Peter Hinz-Rosin)
Reinhard Oellerer, district and municipal councilor of the Greens from Anzing, can also report on the difficulty of finding housing for refugees. For years he has been accompanying people, mostly from African countries, who want to set foot in Anzing, and he has often called potential landlords to do so. “As soon as I said, for example, that it was a man from Eritrea, it quickly said: ‘Yes, I’ll think about it’ – and we never heard from him again,” said Oellerer. Since 2015, some people have been living in a shared room in shared accommodation, with a locker and a shared kitchen – and with little prospect of their own apartment or room.
In 2015, fears about the refugees were deliberately fueled
Fortunately, some of the refugees found accommodation in two buildings belonging to the government of Upper Bavaria on Parkstrasse. In small two-room apartments of about 45 square meters, small families and also a shared apartment are now housed. On the open market, however, it is particularly difficult for men with African roots to find a place to stay. The apartments are few and far between in the region. It was gratifying, of course, but also astonishing for Reinhard Oellerer that numerous Ukrainian refugees had better luck in finding accommodation in a much shorter time. More than 100 tenancies between Ukrainians and Ebersberger landlords have been concluded in the district since the beginning of the war, this number was recently found out in the responsible committee of the district council.
The refugee helper’s assumption as to why this is the case: the sympathy one would have for Ukrainian refugees, the terrible war that is taking place in the European neighborhood, and also that it was and is mainly women and children who are fleeing Ukraine . “In earlier refugee movements,” he says, “there were initially dozens of employees in the ‘Offenes Anzing’ initiative, but there were also fears, and sometimes these were deliberately fueled. On the one hand, there was a lot of empathy, and on the other hand, there was a fear of losing control and foreign infiltration, also outright rejection of the new fellow citizens.”
The Greens politician fears that it will now be even more difficult for refugees to find accommodation in Ebersberg due to a decision by the district: Although the job center is now paying more money for apartments, at the same time the new upper rent limits are based on significantly less actually available Apartments. “In terms of price, this innovation suits the tenants,” says Oellerer, “however, the supply of apartments has been reduced by eight percent.”
The helper groups urgently need new members
Greens district councilor Ottilie Eberl explains that it can of course also be difficult for Ukrainians to look for an apartment in the district. When she accompanied a single Ukrainian woman on a tour and the landlord found out that the job center would initially cover the costs, the man immediately waved him off. He had already had negative experiences with people who were dependent on welfare.
The regulation states that the job center does not transfer the rent directly to the landlord, but to the recipient of the aid. The transfer to the landlord does not always seem to go smoothly, not least because of communication difficulties. In addition, tenants may only sign the rental agreement after the job center has given its approval. “That often delays things,” reports Ottilie Eberl. As a member of a group of helpers, you often act as a half-guarantor here and have to build trust – so that the landlord doesn’t jump off again right away. “It would be important here for the circles of helpers to become larger,” says Eberl.
The family cannot keep up without their own apartment
Caterina Maurizi from Aliens Aid addresses a completely different problem for the refugees, who have been looking for their own apartments in Ebersberg for years. Many recognized refugees need, among other things, their own place to stay before their family members can follow. They have often fled to neighboring countries of their country of origin and are desperately waiting to be able to travel to Germany. 99 percent of the people who already live in Ebersberg are men who are currently living in homeless or asylum accommodation – with little prospect of a change in their situation. “There are families who have been waiting for at least four years to find an apartment in the district,” says Maurizi.