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Cost explosion in youth welfare: Zollernalbkreis under pressure!
The Zollernalbkreis is under financial pressure due to rising social and youth welfare costs. District Administrator Pauli warns of serious challenges in the 2025 budget year.
Cost explosion in youth welfare: Zollernalbkreis under pressure!
The financial situation in the social and youth welfare sector is currently anything but rosy. Again Black Forest messenger reports, the 2025 financial year in the Zollernalb district shows an unspectacular development at first glance. But a closer look reveals a worrying reality: spending on social and youth welfare services is skyrocketing. Treasurer Gerd Beiter informed the district council about the current financial and budget situation and specified the allocations and tax revenue.
After the first six months of the year, an increase of 628,000 euros was recorded. But the total volume of the budget is an impressive 340 million euros. A large item is the planned expenditure in the youth welfare office, which will be 2.4 million euros higher by the end of 2025 than in the previous year. The social welfare office's net expenses for care assistance also increase by 1.3 million euros.
Increasing expenses and case numbers
Forecasts for 2026 indicate additional spending of around ten million euros in social and youth welfare offices. This increase is primarily caused by increasing case numbers and high costs of measures. District Administrator Günther-Martin Pauli warns that these excessive performance standards could endanger the financial stability of the Zollernalb district. He emphasizes the need to provide municipalities with adequate financial resources in order to defuse the situation.
In the larger picture, these challenges can also be seen throughout Germany. Loud Destatis In 2023, the federal, state and local governments spent a total of 71.9 billion euros on child and youth welfare. This corresponds to an increase of 9.2% compared to 2022. After deducting income of around 4.2 billion euros, net expenses fell to around 67.6 billion euros. Here too, the costs for child day care are the largest item at 48.8 billion euros.
Who benefits from the spending?
Fortunately, part of the budget was also invested in educational aid, which amounts to a total of 16.9 billion euros. Particularly noteworthy are the around 1.4 billion euros for social-educational family assistance and around 8.1 billion euros for the accommodation of young people outside the parental home. Investments are also being made: around 3.2% of total expenditure goes into youth work offers and facilities.
There really is something wrong and it remains to be seen how those responsible will react to these developments. The money is needed, not only in the big cities, but also in rural regions, where the challenges are often even greater. Expenditure in recent years shows that the need for support for children and young people is constantly growing. This is also supported by the data from Statista which report on the development of spending on child and youth welfare in Germany since 2001.