“Austria has the lowest acceptance ratings of all member states when it comes to the European Union,” said European MP Hannes Heide yesterday at a press conference together with district chairman Katrin Auer (SP) in Steyr. According to Heide, this is largely due to “the EU bullying by the VP and FP.” Austria is often spoken of as a net contributor. “Far too little attention is paid to how much money flows back to us.”
Heide gave concrete examples of “EU funds that hardly anyone knows about.” Around 159 million euros would be made available for heating replacement in Austria. 172 million euros provided for laptops for students or 130 million euros for the repair bonus. “There is no EU decision in which at least one Austrian is not involved,” adds Heide. The European politician also names a total of 57 projects for Steyr, Steyr-Land and Kirchdorf that were supported with funds from the European Regional Development Fund, or ERDF for short, in the period 2014 to 2020: from the Ennstal cycle path renovation to the expansion of operations at pack it! to the establishment of a gallery in the Bad Hall city theater. The ERDF is intended to make a contribution to minimizing differences in the level of development between the various regions and to improving living conditions in structurally weaker regions.
For Steyr, city councilor Katrin Auer particularly emphasizes the conversion of the bus fleet to vehicles with electric drives: “By the end of 2025, the route operations should be largely electric.” A total of eleven electric buses are to be purchased. This is only possible with so-called EBIN funding (zero-emission buses and infrastructure) from the EU. “80 percent of the additional costs (compared to diesel buses) when purchasing buses and 40 percent of the costs for setting up the charging infrastructure are financed in this way,” says the SP politician. The total funding amount for eleven electric buses for Steyr is 3,168,000 euros. Heide finally appealed to take part in the European elections on June 9th.
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Author
Martin Dunst
Local editor Steyr
Martin Dunst
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