Work to transform the house where Nazi leader Adolf Hitler was born in the Austrian city of Braunau am Inn into a police station is nearing completion, in a project the government says aims to prevent the place from becoming a neo-Nazi shrine. However, this project raises criticism from camp residents and survivors who consider that turning it into a security facility remains a “double-edged sword” and misses the opportunity to make it a space for peace and remembrance.

Published on: 02/21/2026 - 16:02

Work to transform the home of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler in Austria into a police station is almost complete, but this new use of the building, which is mainly intended to distract Nazi fans from visiting it, is still arousing local criticism.

Sybille Trebelmeier, a 53-year-old employee, told Agence France-Presse that converting the house into a police station represents a repurposing that may lead to mixed results, and she went so far as to describe it as a “double-edged sword,” explaining that although she understands the motives for this decision, she believes that “it could have been used differently.”

A 17th century house and a sensitive political context

The building dates back to the seventeenth century, where the German dictator was born on April 20, 1889. It is located on a commercial street in the city of Braunau am Inn in northern Austria, near the border with Germany.

The Austrian Interior Minister announced that the work that began on the house in 2023 will be completed soon, while workers are currently installing the outer frames of the windows and replacing the old yellow paint with a more modern facade.

After a delay of three years from the original schedule, the work is expected to be completed by the end of March, with the police station starting its activity in the second quarter of this year, according to what the ministry reported to Agence France-Presse.​

In doing so, the authorities hope to turn a sensitive page in a country that is sometimes accused of not sufficiently bearing its responsibility for the atrocities of Nazism and the Holocaust, while the far-right party, founded by former Nazis, leads opinion polls after winning the legislative elections in 2024 without succeeding in forming a government.

From a center for people with disabilities to a “magnet” for neo-Nazis

The house, which had been owned by the same family since 1912, had been rented to the Austrian state since 1972, which later turned it into a care center for the disabled, a group that was subjected to severe persecution during the time of the Third Reich.

But for decades, the address remained a center of attraction for those interested in Nazi ideas and those influenced by Hitler's personality, who flocked to the place on symbolic occasions such as his birthday.

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The last owner of the house, Gerlinde Baumer, objected to the conversion of the building and challenged its expropriation by the state by all possible legal means, which required the issuance of a special expropriation law in 2016.

In 2019, the Supreme Court approved the purchase of the building for 810 thousand euros, while its owner was demanding one and a half million, while the state initially offered only 310 thousand euros, noting that the area of ​​the house is about 800 square meters and has two floors.

Disagreement about the most appropriate job for the place

Several options were put forward on how to use the house, but the recommendation of a committee of experts ruled out turning it into a direct memorial site, for fear that it would turn into a pilgrimage site for neo-Nazis.

The option of demolishing the building was also not on the table, as historians stress that Austria must “confront its past” instead of urbanly erasing it.

In the end, it was decided to turn it into a police station, with the aim of clearly indicating that it would never be a place to honor Nazism, even if this approach did not enjoy complete consensus within society.

Criticisms from memory activists and survivors

Writer Ludwik Lahr, a member of an association of concentration camp survivors, told Agence France-Presse that converting the house into a police station “remains problematic, because the police in any political system are obligated to carry out what is asked of them,” alluding to their role in periods of repression.

65,000 Austrian Jews were killed in Nazi camps and 130,000 others were forced to leave the country, making the memory of the place part of a broader narrative about the responsibility of the state and society.​

Laher believes that the most appropriate use for the building is to transform it into a center for promoting peace and dialogue, a proposal that he says previously received broad support but was ultimately not adopted.

France 24/AFP

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