Referendum Denklingen: "Not in vain" - quorum fulfilled

"The efforts of the past few months have not been in vain."

That's what the initiators of the citizens' initiative against massive housing development in Denklingen said after all the votes in the citizens' decision had been counted after 7 p.m. on Sunday evening.

Denklingen – Around a third of the 2256 voters in the towns of Denklingen, Epfach and Dienhausen took part in the vote.

Expressed in numbers: There were 753 people;

this corresponds to 33.3 percent.

For comparison: In the two simultaneous referendums in May 2014 on the wind farm in Denklinger Rotwald and on the planned modern new town hall building on the Neuwirt site, 53.5 percent of those eligible to vote went to the polls.

Back then, the issues were more "emotional," said Johann Hartmann, who is the manager of the community and was the election officer on Sunday, compared last night.

The quorum is satisfied

In the referendum on May 22, the quorum has been met.

More than 20 percent cast their vote.

And: more than a fifth – it was 621 valid votes to be exact – ticked yes and thus supported the cause that the initiators of the citizens' initiative have been campaigning for in the past seven months.

The referendum is thus accepted.

Werner Dacher, Anita Gropp, Manfred Gayer and his wife Gabi believe that two weeks ago we would have had an even higher turnout.

But they still want to "express their thanks" to everyone who voted despite the beautiful weather.

Pleasing voter turnout

Anita Gropp was also pleased with the election turnout and results from Epfach, considering that this town was not nearly as affected by the issue.

There, 110 adults took part in the 564 voters on Sunday.

There were 85 valid votes in Epfach for the referendum.

There were 25 no votes.

However, it can be assumed that some Epfach residents made use of postal voting.

In the polling district for postal voting, which was counted in the evening by six helpers around polling station director Lisa-Maria Steer from the municipal administration in the citizens' hall of the town hall, 266 ballot papers were checked and evaluated.

In the three polling stations on site, employees of the municipal administration were also assigned to manage the respective polling station: Waltraud Gröger in Epfach, Birgit Jost in Denklingen and Katharina Kettner in Dienhausen.

A clear signal to the community so that this does not happen again

The referendum specifically concerned the development plan procedure for the district between Bahnhofstrasse, Bischof-Müller-Strasse, Buchweg and Industriestrasse.

The two apartment buildings with 24 apartments that investor Stefan Friebe wants to build on a vacant lot to the west of the 60 newly built apartments will probably be unavoidable.

But the initiators see the outcome of the referendum as a clear signal to the municipality to take the necessary steps in land use planning "so that something like this doesn't happen again".

From the political side, no representative was present in the town hall on Sunday evening.

Mayor Andreas Braunegger is on a short vacation, it said.