The Brno City Council canceled the tender for the repair of the Tugendhat Villa

Brno - The Brno City Council today canceled the public contract for the restoration of the rare Tugendhat Villa listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site. The reconstruction has thus been postponed further. The reason is the ongoing review of an earlier tender for the project documentation of the repairs, which, according to some indications, might have been manipulated. The councilors also concluded that the last estimate for the repair costs, nearly 200 million crowns, was significantly overestimated.
"Renovation is being postponed in any case, the question remains by how much," said Jiří Zlatuška, a Brno councilor (Brno 2006), who is tasked with overseeing the tender, to ČTK today. According to him, lawyers from the control department of the magistrate are now examining the entire selection process, and the matter is also being addressed by the courts and the Office for the Protection of Competition. A commission composed of experts and politicians selected the architects from the Association for the Tugendhat Villa to create the restoration project two years ago, although when comparing prices excluding VAT, the team of architect Jan Sapák offered a lower price. According to Zlatuška, the association was primarily advocated by politicians from the then city leadership, while experts favored Sapák. Zlatuška also claims today that the amount of around 200 million, cited by the association referring to material and labor costs, was overstated by tens of millions.
The repairs were supposed to start after the New Year, and the construction company Tocháček was awarded the contract in the now-canceled selection process.
The descendants of the original owners, the Tugenhats, are allegedly planning to apply for the return of the villa. The family left the country before the arrival of the Nazis in 1938. Mayor Roman Onderka (CSSD) does not believe that they could reclaim the villa. "Restitution relates to state property, this is city property," he stated a few days ago.