‘There is always a reason for a municipality to dive’

Beds are needed everywhere. Beds for Ukrainians. Beds for outdoor sleepers in Ter Apel. Beds in new asylum seekers’ centers to be built. And those beds are always hard to find.

Of course, some congregations show a big heart. They make an old casino available, they clear a quay for a cruise ship or they quickly convert the town hall into a residential complex for Ukrainians.

But there are also municipalities that contribute little to a solution to the asylum reception crisis, much to the frustration of, among others, State Secretary Eric van der Burg (Asylum). These municipalities do not report to the Central Agency for the Reception of Asylum Seekers (COA) when a (temporary) emergency reception location for asylum seekers is sought, they do not build flexible housing for Ukrainians if the Security Region so requests and they never fill a sports hall with camp beds for crisis emergency reception.

But why not? What arguments do the municipalities use to avoid having to deliver? Are they afraid that residents will revolt, as happened recently in Bant (where the COA wanted to establish a new application center) and Albergen (where up to 300 asylum seekers in a village of 3,500 inhabitants would come)? Or is there more going on?

To find out the answers to those questions, de Volkskrant with seven mayors from all over the country. Two of them are chairman of one of the 25 Dutch Security Regions. Because of the sensitivity of the file – and because the mayors do not want to jeopardize the relationship with other administrators – they tell their story anonymously in this exceptional case.

Argument 1: ‘We have no vacant offices, demolished homes or event areas’

Lack of space? Not every interviewee is impressed by this frequently used argument, especially when it comes to emergency shelter for asylum seekers. A mayor from the east: ‘Why don’t you have a place, I think. You have a school, a sports hall and meadows, don’t you?’

A mayor of a medium-sized city: ‘And if you don’t have room for people from Syria and Afghanistan, then why for Ukrainians? That question led to inconvenience here in the region. Well, that depends on the support among the residents.’

A colleague from a rural community recognizes this. ‘Mayors sometimes package political unwillingness as operational objections. They say they don’t have a location or staff, but as soon as other municipalities start thinking about removing those obstacles, it turns out that something completely different is going on: the city council is hesitant.’

Still, a lack of space is sometimes a real problem, says a chairman of a smaller Security Region. ‘At the beginning of the Ukraine crisis, each region had to supply two thousand places. This was achieved by picking low-hanging fruit. But then in the summer the request came to find a thousand more places. Then it became difficult, also because the hotels were full.’

Argument 2: ‘We lack manpower’

‘Many municipalities hide behind a lack of personnel,’ says the mayor from the east. ‘That’s partly right. But we are talking about an emergency here. Then you have to be creative. We let the Ukrainians help themselves at the reception location. They can cook, clean or sit at the reception.’

Other mayors are more lenient. ‘We have been in a permanent state of crisis for more than three years,’ says a village mayor. ‘When we mastered corona, the war in Ukraine started. And then the request for emergency emergency shelter to relieve Ter Apel. The rubber band is about to burst.’

The rural mayor: ‘Municipalities have to arrange everything themselves for the Ukrainians and the emergency shelter. Setting up a sports hall, putting together beds, installing walls, organizing food, and so on. We had to release five officials for it. Hiring staff for a few months is not an option. Those people aren’t here at the moment.’

‘Large municipalities shift staff more easily’, says a mayor from under the rivers. ‘Then the people from the parks department screw the beds together. This is more difficult for small municipalities. Many people are needed. For example, in a building with three hundred people, there must be two security guards at all times. And that’s not even mentioning everything you need to organize around it. GPs, for example. Here retired doctors provide care to asylum seekers. But that also means that they can no longer run the services at the GP post. So it is closed more often.’

Argument 3: ‘Why should we save the Empire?’

‘It is absurd that we as municipalities now have to provide crisis relief’, says the rural mayor. ‘Formally, the reception of asylum seekers is a task of the national government. There are also drivers who insist on this. Why would they step forward to help the failing central government? That does not yield much politically either.’

‘It should come as no surprise that there are now too few asylum seekers’ centers’, says the chairman of a smaller Security Region. The Empire should have seen that coming.’

‘The cabinet has been solving problems for years by transferring responsibility to municipalities,’ says the village mayor. ‘It’s starting to get messy now. I see municipalities that do not provide extra shelter because they want to keep the pressure on it. Those mayors say: by filling in the gaps, we are perpetuating the problem.’

Argument 4: ‘Look what we do for other groups!’

In order not to have to organize new emergency shelters or crisis emergency shelters for asylum seekers, municipalities regularly point to other work they perform. They already have an asylum seekers’ center. Or they take in a lot of Ukrainians.

Sometimes that is a valid argument, sometimes not. In that case, municipalities emphasize, for example, that they have allocated many social housing units to status holders. But that is a task that every municipality is given every year, says the mayor from the east. ‘Moreover, it is not an answer to the question of what to do with a thousand men who sleep on the street in Ter Apel. These are exceptional circumstances. We have to do something extra.’

Other municipalities rely on the fact that they already house many migrant workers, says the mayor of a medium-sized city. “And so there’s always a reason to dive.”

Argument 5: ‘Now it’s the turn of the region next door’

‘At the beginning of the Ukraine crisis, each region had to find a number of shelters’, says the village mayor. ‘Then came the next question: did we have 150 more? Meanwhile, other regions did not provide half of the places requested. Out of reluctance. That’s frustrating.’

‘My region does much more than the region next door’, says the rural mayor. ‘So when the province asks whether we still have a place for an asylum seekers’ center, we point it out to the neighbors: why don’t they come over? Due to the voluntary nature of the system, some municipalities do nothing. It has to be more compelling.’

‘We have been a bit hesitant here in the region for some time,’ says a mayor of a polder municipality. ‘Because other regions neglected it. But then again, when the water splashes over the skirting boards again, we’ll see what we can do again.’

Argument 6: ‘Don’t run for COA again’

The asylum reception crisis has many ‘old hurts’, as one of the mayors calls it. Several municipalities feel in the past that they have been treated unfairly by the COA, which means that they are now less inclined to cooperate.

‘Years ago we had a discussion here about whether there should be another asylum seekers’ center’, says the rural mayor. ‘In the end everything was in pitchers. And then we heard nothing more from COA.’

‘We wanted to make an office building available in 2015’, says the mayor of a medium-sized city. ‘Negotiations about the conditions and consultation evenings with local residents followed. But in the end we fell off. And that’s how it often goes at COA.’

In a response, the COA says that in 2015 and 2016 many places were suddenly needed for Syrians. That changed after the Turkey deal. The COA, which is financed per received asylum seeker, had to scale down quickly, according to a spokesperson. ‘This was a very undesirable situation for the municipalities and COA. That is why we also advocate stable reception and stable multi-year financing.’

Argument 7: ‘We cannot deliver what COA asks’

The fact that negotiations between COA and municipalities are difficult is also due to the requirements of the COA. “They wanted 500 beds, no less,” says the mayor of a medium-sized city. ‘Because with a large asylum seekers’ center it was easier to arrange security, medical care and education.’ He calls it “spreadsheet logic.” ‘For a long time, COA’s operational management was more important than the social landing of asylum seekers’ centres.’

The mayor from under the rivers recognizes this. A few years ago, COA was looking for an asylum seekers center in its region with five hundred places for five years. “That was too much for us,” she says. “In the end there were three hundred places.”

Even now, this mayor would like to determine for herself how many refugees her municipality takes in. That is why she only creates ‘stepped’ emergency shelters for asylum seekers and Ukrainians. The reception locations grow organically, so that residents can get used to the place and each other and learn which rules apply. ‘You can say numerically: we may need to do more. But I would like to keep the quality in order.’

The village mayor says that municipalities sometimes want to organize emergency shelter for thirty, forty or fifty people. ‘But the government is looking for locations for 250 people. That’s really a thing. I just don’t have places like that here. I only have small gyms. Only when the pressure became too high did the COA release the requirement. Then we built pavilions here. So it’s all really more nuanced than it seems.’

Although the rural mayor sees that municipalities sometimes abuse this. ‘They deliberately make such a small offer that they know for sure that it will not be accepted. Then they say that they want to provide emergency shelter for thirty people for two weeks. While, so to speak, two hundred places are being sought for a three-month period.’

If requested, COA will let you know that it can use both small and large locations. ‘It is true that some scale is required to offer a good basic package of reception facilities and supervision.’ The fact that the COA is aiming high is due to the high need, according to a spokesperson.

Argument 8: ‘We will soon cross the bridge’

Some municipalities do it privately to see if they are benevolent, says the mayor from the east. But when push comes to shove, they don’t deliver. “They’re excuses,” he says. ‘Then administrators claim that they are investigating the possibilities or that they can perhaps take care of the long-term care. And in the meantime, they hope that other municipalities will raise their hand for emergency shelter. That will save the rest of the region.’

The mayor of the countryside recognizes this. ‘A year ago, a municipality here said that they wanted to build flexible housing for status holders at an accelerated pace. But a year later they are still not there.’