Grimmen (dpa/mv) – The city of Grimmen has voted against taking in more refugees. On Thursday evening, 11 of the 18 city representatives present voted for the corresponding application from the city administration, said city spokesman Thorsten Erdmann of the German Press Agency. “It’s a call for help that the city of Grimmen is basically letting go in the direction of the state government.” Erdmann emphasized, “that doesn’t mean that we don’t want to do it, we can’t do it anymore.”
The city took in 333 Ukrainian refugees in February. “As a result, we as the city of Grimmen have more than ten percent of the almost 3,200 Ukrainians who are recorded in the Vorpommern-Rügen district.” You have almost 10,000 residents. According to the current key, Grimmen would only have to take in a maximum of 133 refugees, said Erdmann. The main problem is the acceptance of children and young people in schools and daycare centers. “And that’s where we reached a capacity limit.” There are 41 children who have to go to daycare and 105 school-age girls and boys. “Our schools are bursting at the seams and so are the day-care centers.”
The distribution of refugees among the municipalities is the responsibility of the districts. The Ministry of the Interior had also pointed this out in connection with Grimmen and announced talks with the district administrator of Western Pomerania-Rügen.
According to Erdmann, the current situation also overwhelms the household. For integration you need the appropriate infrastructure and finances. “Both are no longer given here in Grimmen.” If there is no care for the children and young people, the integration of their parents will also suffer. “That’s why we strictly reject the fact that we appear here as antisocial or lack solidarity with other communities.”
The decision also comes with a view to the expected additional refugees who could come from Ukraine in winter. This means that further recordings could also be made for Grimmen. Other municipalities are doing the same. “Only Grimmen now had the courage to say that.”
According to Erdmann, seven representatives of the Left and SPD voted for their own application, which advocated raising additional funds from the state in order to avoid a freeze on admissions. In addition, they had concerns about a possible illegality of the application. The CDU voted unanimously for the application.
In view of the growing problems with the accommodation of refugees, CDU state and parliamentary group leader Franz-Robert Liskow had called for more support for the municipalities in the state and a stricter migration policy by the federal government. According to him, there is also information from other districts in the north-east that the accommodation options for refugees there have been exhausted or will soon be exhausted.
