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Sharp accusations, heated tempers and an announced lawsuit: the discussion about an Eiterfeld industrial park is developing into an ongoing political dispute.
Eiterfeld – Many speeches, heated tempers and the announcement of a lawsuit against the administration characterized the most recent meeting of the Eiterfeld municipal council. The greatest excitement of the evening in the Eiterfeld district court was preceded by an application from the FWG parliamentary group on the status of the “Auf der Großmühl” industrial park, which was initiated in 2017.
The inquiry served to clarify which companies had expressed interest and how many companies left the community due to the long period of non-development. The background, according to parliamentary group leader Pascal Möller, was the surprising announcement from the community board in response to a CDU request in January, “that due to the non-development of the commercial area, tax revenues had been lost to a considerable extent due to people moving away and not settling,” after a related request from the FWG in 2024 had not yielded any information.
Threat of lawsuit and heated debate about Eiterfelder industrial park
Mayor Dana Hauke (CDU) preceded her answer with a reference to data protection: Specific names, company departures or relocations could only be mentioned with the companies' consent. In addition, it was announced as early as 2024 that a total of five companies had expressed interest.
“The statement that there were no developments or findings whatsoever does not correspond to the actual information provided by the community board,” said Hauke. A total of 81 business de-registrations took place in the requested period from January 2023 to April 2024.
Möller was not satisfied with this answer: “Part of the inquiry was which and how many companies had inquired. I cannot imagine that there are no figures for this.” If the community board does not want to communicate this on its own initiative, there will be a “lawsuit before the administrative court,” said Möller.
“A lawsuit against the community board is your right. This has been tried out several times in Eiterfeld in the past. The outcome of the lawsuits is known to those present here,” replied Hauke. Möller repeated his statement that the community board was unwilling to answer the request.
He suspected that the community board was trying to hide something. Heiko Mähler (FWG), who was deputy head of the municipal council, introduced Mayor Hauke's amendment to ask the affected companies to release data. This was rejected with the 15 votes of the CDU majority.
Supplementary budget and temporary zebra crossing
This had already been preceded by a dispute over the resolution of a supplementary budget for 2026, which is related to the commercial area. “The CDU is planning to take on a million more debts,” said Möller. The FWG is fundamentally for progress, but supplementary budgets are not a normal tool, “but rather reactions to unexpected events in the current year.”
Marc Ide (SPD) said: “We reject the supplementary budget. A commercial area needs living space where workers can settle.” This is not available. The budget was approved with 15 CDU votes, two abstentions from the Greens and 10 no votes from the FWG and SPD.
Another topic was that Traffic situation on Schulstrasse, which serves as an alternative route during construction work on Marktstrasse. After a partly controversial debate about a temporary zebra crossing requested by the FWG, the mayor made it clear that the responsible authorities had already rejected one.
Finally, the parliamentary groups agreed that the community board would again seek discussions with the responsible authorities. The correspondingly amended motion was approved unanimously. (by Immanuel Dobrowolski)
