Berlin falls on hard times
June 5, 1996
Web Posted at: 11:00 a.m. EDTFrom Correspondent Bill Delaney
BERLIN (CNN) -- Delegates to the United Nations' Habitat II summit are wrestling with the issue of housing shortages and other urban dilemmas. The financially pinched city of Berlin can feel their pain.
City officials estimate 60,000 apartments are needed to help accommodate the flood of immigrants who have moved to Berlin from the former East Germany and the thousands of federal workers relocating there from Bonn.
But, Berlin can only afford to build 30,000 units. When the Berlin Wall that divided the city in two disappeared in 1989, so did the subsidies from Bonn in the west and Moscow in the east that had kept the city financially afloat.
While any actions taken at the U.N. conference in Istanbul may do little to help Berlin directly, delegates are especially intent on focusing the world's attention on housing problems.
They plan to seek a compromise Wednesday on the right to housing. Delegates from developing nations, backed by the European Union, are demanding that housing be declared a human right.
However, some Western nations such as the United States are wary of a declaration that would allow individuals to sue a government for not providing housing. The role of government in providing housing will be discussed by a panel Wednesday that includes U.N. Assistant Secretary-General Wally N'Dow.
Arts threatened
Berlin, long a champion of the arts -- Bertolt Brecht's "Three Penny Opera" premiered there -- now finds those pursuits a luxury compared to providing basic services and keeping residents employed.
In the past five years, 25,000 city jobs have been eliminated, and there are plans to lay off 22,000 more employees by 1999. Universities are trimming as many as 30,000 positions.
Holger Teschke of the Berliner Ensemble Theatre fears government cuts this year of nearly $750,000.
"The most important thing is that we can't produce enough new plays, and people expect that from us. They don't want to see things that are on the stage since two to three years already," he said.
Peter Radunski, Berlin's culture senator, thought the city's problems would pass quickly, but now he's pessimistic.
"This is a period of transition . . . And at first, we thought it is only a short period. But now we learned that it is a period of about 10 years or more."
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