Image Credit: NurPhoto / Contributor / Getty 
In the city of Bochum, an accommodation housing migrants and homeless people is located directly next door to an AWO kindergarten at Höntroper Straße, sparking a major scandal that the city is trying to downplay. The situation is so bad that daycare workers are armed with whistles, with the children trained to run inside their kindergarten if there is another incident involving residents of the nearby asylum/homeless center.
Daycare workers and children are terrified due to a range of incidents, including “massive verbal assaults,” stones being thrown at the kindergarten, and individuals climbing onto the daycare property. The homeless people at the shelter are known to suffer from mental issues and drug addiction problems.
🇩🇪🔴"Children no longer want to go to daycare out of fear."
— Remix News & Views (@RMXnews) July 10, 2025
German children in a kindergarten in Bochujm have been trained to flee inside if daycare workers blow crisis whistles if there is danger, all due to asylum shelter right next door.
At the AWO kindergarten at Höntroper… pic.twitter.com/xYiQckpKQb
As Welt reports: “Since the beginning of the year, teachers at a local daycare center have been threatened and even had stones thrown at them. Parents and children are now afraid….As an initial measure, the daycare center has drawn up an emergency plan with the children and equipped all teachers with whistles.
“The children were trained. Theoretically, this happens when an incident occurs and a whistle is blown. The children should leave everything and then run into the daycare center,” said Nicola Heiland, the father of a child in the daycare center.
The city is offering no long-term solution because the German government itself has no solution to the migration crisis or the deteriorating crime crisis. Instead, daycare workers are simply armed with whistles.
One mother, Romy Keller, told Welt: “That makes me angry. I can’t understand how a city can be responsible that an emergency shelter for drug addicts is right next to two schools and a kindergarten.”
Parents complained that police have been repeatedly sent to the location to deal with interventions, including when daycare staff were subjected to verbal harassment.
In a report from German public media station WDR, a mother said she witnessed a woman climbing the fence between the two facilities and then running on the property of the kindergarten. The woman said she immediately feared for her daughter’s safety and informed the management of the daycare. The daycare staff found the intoxicated woman and escorted her off the daycare grounds. The woman was unable to explain why she was there and appeared confused, according to sources involved in the case.
Welt reported that a man came to the property several times. “Once he tried to climb over the fence. He has verbally threatened educators. And this man was here several times, for example, he opened the door to the kindergarten, but didn’t go in.”
The children are so terrified that they are asking: “Is the bad man back?”
Other parents said they saw similar incidents, but so far their complaints have gone unanswered by the city government.
“The city, the mayor, the police – they have asked everywhere for help, seemingly without success,” reads an article on WDR.
Radio Bochum reported on the incident as well, noting in an article: “The children no longer want to go to daycare; they’re scared and have nightmares. It’s difficult for parents when children talk about naked men or wake up in the night.”
The radio station noted that the city has not even installed a privacy fence between the daycare and the refugee/homeless center. That means tenants of the center are free to stare at the children from their windows or from the grounds of the facility if they so please. Now, the parents are requesting a “climb-proof fence” with a privacy screen to be built to protect their children at the very minimum.
However, WDR writes that parents “wish the city to find alternative accommodation for the homeless residents of the collective shelter. If possible, not directly next to a daycare center.”
In 2019, WDR indicates that the building next to the kindergarten only housed refugee families, but since then, homeless people have also been occupants.
WDR notes the city of Bochum refused to conduct an interview regarding the woman who climbed her way onto daycare grounds, but released a statement stating it was an “isolated case.”
After the incident, public order officers patrolled near the fence, but only for a limited time. However, there were other incidents at the daycare, including men from the center approaching the children on the street outside the daycare.
The parents’ wish to move the shelter does not appear to be happening anytime soon. Instead, the The Workers’ Welfare Association (AWO), which operates the collective shelter, says it will implement more security measures. However, there are already security staff operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Still, the incidents keep occurring.
There is now an urgent motion put forward by the Christian Democrats (CDU), the Free Democrats (FDP) and the Free Citizens council groups to revert the facility back to only refugees.
“We believe this is the only viable option,” wrote CDU council group leader Karsten Herlitz in a statement. “It is a sign of respect to address the needs of each individual group. What happened here should serve as a warning to us. The incidents are not excusable, but they are explainable.”
