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The cantons would like the shelter locations to be announced to the population – before things get serious.
Everyone should know where their shelter is – now, i.e. before a possible emergency: The federal government should therefore check with cantons and municipalities whether the locations could not be announced to the entire population in advance. This is what the Intergovernmental Conference for the Military, Civil Defense and Fire Brigade (RK MZF) calls for.
In some cantons, the residents are aware of the locations, says the President of the RK MZF, Lucerne Security Director Paul Winiker (SVP). But not everywhere: “From the point of view of the RK MZF, this is not satisfactory. It is also not appropriate due to the knowledge gained from the Ukraine war.”
Doubts about rapid shelter allocation
The majority of the government councilors responsible for civil protection therefore doubt that in a crisis everyone can be informed of the location of a shelter quickly enough: “In a crisis or a war event, time is short and we cannot fully rely on the communication systems either .»
The federal government reacted reservedly for the time being: “We take note of the concerns of the RK MZF,” writes the Federal Office for Civil Protection (FOCP) on request. In any case, the publication of the allocation plan is not planned today. At the request of the cantons, however, the FOCP can examine a corresponding change.
Canton Solothurn expresses concerns about the proposal
In some cantons and municipalities, however, experts have doubts about the RK MZF’s proposal. The head of the office for military and civil protection in the canton of Solothurn, Diego Ochsner, is already anticipating complaints if the population were informed in advance about shelter locations: “People would call and say, I don’t want to go to Heinz Müller shelter in an emergency. Our office would thus become a kind of hotel reception.”
If you look at where you are today, it might be somewhere else tomorrow.
And that is not the task of the Office for the Military and Civil Protection. The proposal is also not practicable because of a change of residence: “If you look today where your location is, it may be in a different place tomorrow.”
Request for information brochure
The cantons, on the other hand, are running open doors to the federal government with a second concern: Accordingly, all residents should be informed what to do if shelters have to be visited. According to the President of the RK MZF, Paul Winiker, a number of questions have to be answered: “What do you have to take with you to the shelter, how does the stay there work – from food to disposal? There are many questions, and these could be clarified together with the federal government and the cantons in a brochure.” The brochure could then be distributed to all households in the country.
The Federal Office for Civil Protection is preparing the relevant information material.
The Federal Office for Civil Protection is actually having such thoughts at the moment: “BABS is preparing the relevant information material,” it writes.
Basically, many shelters may need a thorough renovation first: Older air raid shelters in particular would have to be retrofitted, the RK MZF recently demanded in the “NZZ am Sonntag”.