Schwerin/Upahl (dpa/mv) – In the legal dispute over the construction of refugee accommodation with 400 places in the 500-inhabitant village of Upahl (Northwest Mecklenburg district), the district does not receive any backing from the Ministry of the Interior of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. It is clear that the new building requires a building permit, the ministry said on Tuesday at the request of the German Press Agency. With this justification, the administrative court in Schwerin stopped the construction of the container accommodation, which had already begun, in an urgent decision last Friday. The municipality of Upahl had sued because it had not been involved. According to the district, it has not yet decided whether to appeal the court decision.
District administrator Tino Schomann (CDU) explained that an information paper from the government level shows that you have up to three months for the building permit. The validity of this guideline was last confirmed to the district on January 27, 2023 by the Ministry of the Interior. “The Ministry of the Interior, as the state’s technical supervisor and upper building supervisory authority, has given us guidelines for action, which we, as the lower building authority, of course take up and proceed with.”
The Ministry of the Interior, on the other hand, emphasized that the aforementioned toleration of accommodation without a building permit for three months only applies to accommodation in existing buildings. The information letter available to the German Press Agency reads: “Temporary accommodation/Duldung. If, due to the need for accommodation in a timely manner, it is not possible to carry out a necessary building permit procedure before the start of use or if only temporary accommodation is intended in buildings, the The competent lower building control authority temporarily tolerate the accommodation of refugees and asylum seekers in buildings that have not been approved for this purpose, i.e. usually for no more than three months.”
The district administrator expressed the opinion that the administrative court in Schwerin had clearly contradicted this advisory paper. According to the court, proper building application procedures are absolutely necessary “contrary to the guideline paper of the Ministry of the Interior”. The court decision has far-reaching effects for everyone who would have to create community accommodation – not only in Northwest Mecklenburg.
The Ministry does not share this concern. It is assumed that the technical expertise in the building authorities nationwide exists, that new buildings require a prior building permit, it said. The legal regulations “cannot be waived by instructions from a ministry”.
