Berlin: Berliners will vote on the referendum to force the main property company to sell thousands of flats to the city, officials said on Thursday because the problem of high-rental-year elections heated up.
The grassroots petition campaign was driven by anger at the cost of housing that jumped 183,711 a valid signature, “More than the total needed” around 172,000 to ask questions to the general election, the Berlin election supervisor said.
Local officials must now set a date for voting, which is widely expected to be held on September 26, on the same day as the election for the new Federal Parliament and the Berlin government.
“Deutsche Wohnen & Co.
claimed to be” initiative, named Berlin’s largest property group, targeting companies with more than 3,000 apartments in their portfolios.
This movement wants to see more than 240,000 houses placed under public agencies to be given “democratically, transparently and public interest”.
The results of the referendum were not binding, said a spokesman for the Election Authority, but it would significantly raise pressure on the government to take action.
In the city of 3.7 million inhabitants where more than 80 percent rented their homes, the attraction of capital to investors and structural lack of housing sent prices that jumped by almost 85 percent between 2007 and 2019.
The Government of Berlin has moved to freeze rent for Five years from 2020 to stop the escaping gentrification, but the Federal Constitutional Court decided that the policy was illegal in April.
“Deutsche Wohnen & Co.
bases their claims in Article 15 of the German Constitution, which stipulates that” land, natural resources, and production facilities can be transferred to public ownership “in the public interest in return for compensation.
Adopted in 1949 with the establishment of Western Germany.
, the article was long forgotten during the Cold War with tensions between Western capitalists and East Communists.
Deutsche Wohnen has around 111,000 from an estimate of two million rented apartments in Berlin and in May announced plans to join fellow giant giant vonovia.
That sharply criticized the initiative Aiming as a counterproductive “because it doesn’t create a one square meter of additional guest room”.
“We need to build more housing to alleviate market pressure, which is why we will step over the building in the coming years in Berlin,” said a spokesman for AFP.
Social Democrats City Michael Mueller also rejects ref Erendum, prefers “partnerships with the private sector” to develop more housing.