Insufficient funds have led to a predicament. - In 2025, a 29-euro fare will be evaluated.
Starting July 1st, a monthly ticket worth 29 euros meant for Berlin's public transportation might not last long. With the need for the state to save at least 2 billion euros in the upcoming year, many big-ticket items are being reexamined, as per reports from within the black-red coalition on Tuesday.
Independent senate departments will suggest ways to save up to 10% of their budget in the coming months. Subsequently, the coalition will determine which of these savings will be put into place. The monthly ticket, which costs approximately 300 million euros a year, is certainly up for discussion.
In a meeting on Sunday, a coalition summit arrived at a lengthy list of approximately 600 individual money-saving measures for the current year. These details were shared on Tuesday by Finance Senator Stefan Evers (CDU) with the Senate and the factions.
Major cuts are planned for teacher salaries (65 million euros), university grants (55 million euros), and BVG subsidies (20 million euros). A compensation fund for violence victims will lose 11.5 million euros, while climate-friendly construction funding will be reduced by 10 million euros. Abandoning a new voluntary fire brigade building in Wilhelmshagen will result in cost savings of 6.9 million euros.
These measures aim to save 2% of the budget, equating to over 550 million euros in total. The overall savings goal in the 39 billion euro budget (known as the general reduction) is 1.75 billion euros, although it's not the responsibility of the senate departments to reach this figure.
A few weeks earlier, financial experts in the coalition identified approximately 1.2 billion euros in savings opportunities in the 2024 budget; they believe these savings won't cause any disruption. These include unused funds for personnel, public transit, and building for both schools and housing.
This year's budget has a total volume of 39.3 billion euros; next year it will grow to 40.5 billion euros. These high expenditures are unprecedented in Berlin's history. The coalition's objective is to bring down the budget volume, inflated by the pandemic, in the near future. For 2025, their target is to reduce it by 2 billion euros. It's even possible that additional cuts will be necessary if tax income decreases.
Given the current circumstances, CDU and SPD have come together to form a joint budget working group. Additionally, periodic coalition summits regarding finances are now planned, starting at monthly intervals.
