As of: March 14, 2024, 12:00 p.m
By: Magnus Reitinger
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Compensatory areas are necessary for construction projects on greenfield sites (here is a picture of the construction area east of Praelatenweg).
The city of Weilheim has also had an “eco account” for a long time, for which a cost reimbursement statute has now been issued.
© Rudder
The city of Weilheim's handling of compensation areas for new building projects must become more transparent - also with regard to costs.
The auditors in the town hall recently warned of this.
A new statute should now redeem this.
But it probably won't bring the city any more money.
Weilheim
- If construction measures interfere with nature and the landscape, compensation must be ensured.
This has been regulated in the Federal Nature Conservation Act and the Building Code for several years.
The person responsible must bear the compensation.
In order to reserve space for future compensation measures - especially as part of land-use planning - the city of Weilheim began setting up a so-called "eco account" in 2011.
According to the city planning office, twelve areas with a total of around eleven hectares are currently registered.
A good quarter of this has already been committed to various development plans.
In addition, there are further (but significantly fewer) areas in a “forest eco-account” set up in 2017.
The building committee has already approved
These figures were mentioned this week in the building committee because the city council's audit committee had called for a more transparent handling of the city's compensation areas in its most recent report (we reported).
Committee chairman Horst Martin (SPD) complained in January that in some cases there were no notes in the city building office, and in others there were only handwritten notes about the withdrawal of individual areas from the eco-account;
there is a lack of a proper overview.
More legal certainty through new statutes
The auditors also recommended issuing a “compensation area cost reimbursement statute” so that the city could bill those responsible for the actual costs of providing the compensation areas.
The committee gave the town hall such statutes from other municipalities as a model.
Building on this, the city building authority now presented the draft of such a cost reimbursement statute for Weilheim for voting.
The building committee already unanimously approved this on Tuesday.
This will be decided at the city council meeting next Thursday, March 21st.
The new statutes, the building committee said, would bring “more legal certainty”.
However, this will “not generate any additional income,” said Manfred Stork, head of the city’s construction administration.
The costs incurred have already been passed on to the respective builders – through urban development contracts.
“We haven’t made any mistakes in the past,” emphasized Stork, “we haven’t let any money slip through our fingers.”
No more bureaucracy than before
In the case of new designations, such as the younger residential areas on the outskirts of the city (e.g. on Gögerl, on Hardtfeld or east of Prälatenweg), the costs in terms of compensation areas were “already passed on,” explained the head of the building administration.
In other cases, builders brought in their own areas as ecological compensation, for example the investor of the new residential development on the meadow between Schießstattweg and Schmuzerstrasse.
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If compensation is not possible in the development plan area itself and the building applicant does not have other corresponding areas, then the city can make these available from its “eco account”.
The person responsible must pay for the costs; in future this will be billed on the basis of the new cost reimbursement regulations.
“This gives us a clear legal basis,” said CSU parliamentary group spokeswoman Marion Lunz-Schmieder in the building committee, and this will mean “no more bureaucracy than we already have – but unfortunately no less either.”
Also read:
City defends itself against massive new construction plans - and is annoyed with the district office