Decision made

Fire department leadership is recalled unanimously

The lights will soon go out for the Marchtrenk fire department

(Bild: P. Huber)

No one is officially commenting yet, but it is clear that the blue lights will go out at the command of the Marchtrenk fire department in a few days' time. This is because the special Marchtrenk town council has unanimously decided that the application for dismissal will be approved by the next municipal council. This is how the procedure works.

On Thursday evening, the municipal council in Marchtrenk unanimously broke the baton over the command of the municipal fire department. This leaked out after the two-and-a-half-hour special town council meeting on Monday evening. The experts from the KPMG agency had presented the audit of the Florianijünger. Allegations that the finances had been used for "shenanigans" had not been refuted. At the special city council with all parliamentary group leaders - SPÖ, FPÖ, ÖVP, Greens and MFG - it was decided to jointly initiate the impeachment proceedings on Thursday.

Provincial fire brigade commander has final say
This motion by the municipal council is necessary so that the Upper Austrian Provincial Fire Brigade Command can take action. The fire department commander of the Wels-Land district will be consulted, but ultimately it is up to Robert Mayer, the Upper Austrian state fire brigade commander, to either dismiss or confirm the command. Mayer bases his decision on recommendations from the municipality and district commander. The decision is issued in the form of a ruling, which can be appealed against. Once the decision becomes final, the mayor must call new elections.

Act goes to the judiciary
However, the dismissal will not be the end of the story for the command. There could be claims from the city. In any case, the financial audit file will be made available to the public prosecutor's office in Wels and the fraud investigators of the State Office of Criminal Investigation in order to examine it for possible criminal allegations - the presumption of innocence applies.