Should the Landestheater move to a permanent interim venue (ISS) during the four-year renovation phase or not? After the question had long been answered with "yes", a cost explosion in the planned construction of this ISS had now sparked a new discussion. Instead of the estimated six million euros, there is suddenly talk of an amount in the double-digit millions,
This week, several city council factions therefore submitted an urgent motion to forego the ISS.
But this proposal was rejected by the city council on Thursday – by a narrow margin of 19:20 votes.
Representatives of CSU/JC, Pro Coburg, SBC and FDP voted in favor of the emergency motion – SPD, CSB and Greens were against it.
The discussion lasted a total of five hours. In the end, there was another close vote: With 22 votes to 17, the city council allowed negotiations to continue on an interim venue for the Landestheater.
In December 2016, the city council had decided that an interim venue should be made available for the renovation period of the Landestheater starting in 2019. The specification was for a lightweight stage and audience structure that could be dismantled and resold afterwards. It should cost a maximum of six million euros.
But no bidders came forward in response to the call for bids to build what the city had intended to build. "There was a steel construction that could be dismantled and a wooden panel construction", reported Peter Cosack. They were considerably more expensive than expected. The city wants to continue negotiations with both bidders. For this, however, the decision that the costs would be capped had to be rescinded – because the six million euros would not have been possible anyway, given the state of affairs.
A cross-faction alliance had demanded that this cap be maintained. It could not prevail. However, the city council will decide in November, when a final price has been negotiated, whether an interim theater will be built in steel or wooden panel construction, or whether one will be built at all.