The responsible city councilor Christoph Wiederkehr (NEOS) and department head Georg Hufgard-Leitner announced on Friday that 50 additional employees will be hired. The applications have risen, and the CoV crisis has also increased the pressure on the authority, it said. As a result, criticism about the duration of the proceedings had recently been repeated.
Long duration of proceedings
These are often about human livelihoods, such as the question of whether residence permits are valid, was a return issue. The department deals with around 150,000 procedures per year, which are associated with one million customer contacts. Since this contact often has to be made by phone or email during the pandemic, the processes would be delayed.
In addition, the range of tasks is growing, as it was said. The Brexit procedures for British citizens living in Austria must also be processed. Applications for citizenship for relatives of Nazi victims – which are possible due to the new legal regulation – are also processed by MA 35.
New service center as the first point of contact
In order to at least minimize the additional work, 50 new employees are to be taken on this year. In addition, a service center will be set up – with additional staff – to guarantee better accessibility to the authority. This should also serve as the first point of contact in the future.
As the head of the authority Hufgard-Leitner assured, efforts are already being made to process cases quickly: “We handle more than half of all applications on the same day.” However, there are also cases in which many circumstances have to be clarified, which would delay treatment .
“Countless things that should be changed”
Wiederkehr emphasized that MA 35 often had no discretion because it was bound by federal laws. Here there are “constant changes and tightening”, which would also mean a great challenge for the authority. “There are countless things that need to be changed.” For example, the laws on naturalization are too restrictive and “sometimes absurd,” said Wiederkehr.
This has led, for example, to the fact that fewer people have recently been eligible to vote in Vienna. Vienna is a cosmopolitan city, continues Wiederkehr: “We are happy about people who feel that they belong to Vienna and who move to Vienna.” These deserve correct procedures.
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