Grimma's Lord Mayor Matthias Berger (non-party) sees Saxony's municipalities in a precarious situation. "The budgets are no longer balanced because the costs have exploded. We no longer have the money to be active and innovative. The municipalities are being patronized in every respect," the 56-year-old told the German Press Agency. There is an alienation between the state and the municipal level. Head of government Michael Kretschmer is much more communicative than his predecessor Stanislaw Tillich (both CDU) and a nice person. "But it doesn't help the Free State to have a Minister President who has shaken hands with every Saxon once. He has failed to make structural changes."
This is exactly what the former Saxon Finance Minister Georg Unland (CDU) called for years ago. During a speech at the tax office in Grimma, Unland said that Saxony would go up the tree financially if bureaucracy was not cut back and structures were not changed. "The number of state civil servants was once supposed to fall to 70,000, now we are approaching 100,000. 40 percent of the state budget goes on personnel costs. That is bitter from the perspective of a local politician," emphasized Berger.
