The Hradec Králové Region wants to return Škroup’s house to the municipality of Osice. The aim is to enable the historic building to be repaired and revived. In a new agreement with the municipality, the region should undertake to provide project documentation for the reconstruction and contribute financially to the construction, according to Dan Lechmann, a spokesman for the regional administration. The plan has been discussed by the county council and still needs to be approved by the regional council.
“Despite a search for a meaningful use, when we discussed with regional organisations, cultural institutions and the local action group Hradecky rural, we came together with the municipality to the only mutually beneficial solution. The municipality of Osice, with the help of the region, will renovate the property and use it as a municipal house and for local purposes in this municipality of half a thousand people,” said Václav Řehoř (ODS), councillor for regional property.
The county is responding to the municipality’s request for the return of Škroup’s house. In 2018, the county took over the property from Osice, the main idea being to save the property, which refers to the prominent native František Škroup. The donation agreement stipulated that if the county did not begin renovations within five years, which it has not, the municipality has the option of asking for the return of the house. The original plans for socio-cultural use of the building were disrupted by the coronavirus pandemic and the original cost estimate was increased several times, the county said.
Under the new contract, the county will undertake to provide design documentation for the building and the subsequent final building permit. “Subsequently, the actual donation agreement for the transfer of the ownership of the land in question, including the authorisation to carry out the construction, will be concluded,” Lechmann said.
The municipality will undertake to carry out the reconstruction within five years using its own resources in the amount of CZK 15 million and the remaining costs will be covered by the region. “The municipality will then operate the building in the long term, for at least 20 years, using it exclusively for cultural and educational and community activities or otherwise in the public interest,” Lechmann said.
In September 2023, county councillors cleared the way for the return of the building to the municipality by rescinding a 2018 county council resolution to donate the Škroup House to the county. The county has had a building permit for the renovation since January 2022.
The Škroup House in Osice was built as a tribute to composer and Osice native František Škroup in 1928 on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the establishment of independent Czechoslovakia. It is not the composer’s birth house. The municipal government of the time provided the land, the money for the construction came from a collection of citizens. The building was built in the style of interwar modernism according to the design of architect Jindřich Smetana and served its purpose until 1951. It was used for theatre, dances, balls and other events.
The composer and conductor Škroup was born in Osice in 1801. Škroup’s song Where is my home was first heard in Josef Kajetán Tyl’s play Fidlovačka or No anger and no fight, and in 1918 it was enacted as the national anthem.
Source: Hradec Králové Region and CTK
Photo: Wikipedie
