Status: 16.01.2024, 18:27 PM
By: Andrea Beschorner
CommentsPrint Share
The budget of the city of Freising for the year 2024 is absolutely sewn on edge. A financial plan was drawn up without a buffer for the unforeseen. © Oliver Berg
Freising's Treasurer Johannes Hutter and Mayor Tobias Eschenbacher have made the impossible possible: A draft budget is available that can be approved with a very high degree of probability.
Freising – There can be no talk of easing the financial situation, the budget of the city of Freising for the year 2024 is absolutely sewn on edge. And Lord Mayor Tobias Eschenbacher summed it up at the beginning as follows: "We will then have a financial plan without a buffer. The moment something unforeseen comes along, we will have to take it away somewhere else in order to be able to react." And then, in the end, perhaps even events would have to believe in it.
Nevertheless, as recently as December, no one could really imagine how to achieve a budget that could be approved – and that after hours of (special) meetings on the subject of finances, after various retreats to which the parliamentary groups had withdrawn, after countless ideas that were introduced, but which had not brought in the necessary savings in total.
Freising's treasurer makes the impossible possible
Now the only thing that helped was tabula rasa. Johannes Hutter has spent the past few weeks calculating, pushing, stroking, tightening. Eschenbacher's conclusion: "A lot is demanded of all of us. Everyone has their hobbyhorse, and this household is going to hurt each of us." According to him, the mayor is particularly hard hit by the unavoidable tax increases – trade tax and property taxes. "I am very critical of raising taxes. The problem is no longer that companies are leaving, but that they are quitting prematurely because they are already having a hard time finding a successor," said Eschenbacher. Therefore, he asked that the increase be understood as a temporary measure, and "as soon as we have stabilized, we will reduce taxes again."
The fact that one should survive 2024 without any financial buffer was heavy in the stomach of some city councillors. And so, for example, Robert Weller (FW) spoke out in favour of the suggestion put forward by Susanne Günther (Greens) to increase the property tax B not only by 40, but by 80 points, in order to generate a certain amount of leeway and to be able to react quickly in an emergency – Weller was thinking of unforeseen storms, for example – without having to reallocate funds.
There will be no buffers
Ulrich Vogl (ÖDP) praised the "professional approach to this draft", spoke of very modern management management, the removal of the buffers and the putting of part of the savings into a savings account. However, according to Eschenbacher, in order to achieve a budget that can be approved, the city of Freising would have to cancel what is not available anyway. "We're cutting away what we don't have anyway."
According to financial officer Monika Schwind (FSM), the fact that the present draft is fair can be seen from "the fact that it hits everyone equally hard".
In the end, there was the redeeming message from the treasurer, which all city councillors had hoped for so much: "I firmly believe that we will get this budget approved." There was even applause for that. This was preceded by the detailed report of the treasurer and some other savings proposals of the city councillors.