The area at Bogensee with the former villa of Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels has been languishing for decades. Now Berlin’s finance senator is making an announcement about the future of the property.
Berlin’s Finance Senator Stefan Evers wants to give away an area on Bogensee with a former villa of Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels in Wandlitz if necessary. “I offer anyone who would like to take over the site to take it over as a gift from the state of Berlin,” said the CDU politician on Thursday in the House of Representatives. So far, neither the municipality of Wandlitz nor the state of Brandenburg nor the federal government have been interested in such a “generous gift”.
The approximately 17 hectare site on which Goebbels had a country house built has been unused since 2000 and has fallen into disrepair. After the end of the Nazi dictatorship, the Allies briefly used the site as a military hospital. In 1946, the Soviets handed the site over to the Free German Youth (FDJ), which founded a youth college there.
For some time now there has been increasing discussion about ideas for using the area, which belongs to the state of Berlin. Berlin is considering demolishing the buildings and renaturalizing the areas because the annual costs for security and maintenance run into the millions.
Evers assured that the capital would not turn away from useful conceptual considerations if they were in the city’s interest and did justice to the complex historical significance of the area. Against this background, he is looking forward to proposals from the federal government or from Brandenburg and to the naming of possible sources of money, such as funding.
“But if this should once again lead to nothing, as it has in the past decades, then the state of Berlin has no other option than to carry out the demolition in the way that has now been prepared and addressed by us,” said Evers.
Berlin has been trying to ensure a future for the area for decades. “But the truth is that this decades-long effort was very one-sided.” You have to rely on partners at the federal level and in Brandenburg, with whom it has not been possible to make any progress so far.
