Converted town squares, renovations, kindergartens – 383 Upper Austrian municipalities have so far collected 125 million euros in federal funding for these and other projects. In 2020, the government decided on a community investment package worth one billion euros to alleviate the coronavirus financial problems of the communities and to stimulate the economy. 162 million euros have been reserved for Upper Austria. 50 percent of the investment volume will be funded, the projects must be started by the end of 2022.
The business-liberal think tank Agenda Austria has analyzed the current funding program, from today you can view the funding for all municipalities at agenda-austria.at.
The ten municipalities with the largest funding amounts are Linz, Wels, Leonding, Traun, Marchtrenk, Gmunden, Vöcklabruck, Ried, Enns and Ansfelden. The larger the community, the more is available. Nothing at all has been funded in 55 municipalities – for example in Steyr. “The list of projects has been decided, the applications are in progress, we will collect everything we are entitled to in the next few weeks,” says Mayor Gerald Hackl.
Examples of projects that have already been funded are the general renovation of the Auwiesenstrasse foot and cycle bridge in Linz, the redesign of Kaiser-Josef-Platz in Wels, the roof renovation of the Hart emergency center in Leonding, the renovation of the Traun sports center and the construction of a new kindergarten in Marchtrenk.
All over Austria, 760 million euros have been called up so far – 30 percent for ecological measures (at least 20 percent according to the government).
Of course there are deadweight effects because some projects have already been put in the drawer, says Marcell Göttert, expert for public finances at Agenda Austria: “But promoting such investments makes sense and is sustainable.” However, it is to be feared that there will be blank spots on the map until the end, because certain municipalities cannot afford half of the investment costs.
