City mayors from Romania have accused the Government it had not consulted them regarding the state budget draft for 2019, asking for an emergency meeting with PM Dancila on Tuesday.
„The Association of the Cities in Romania has repeatedly asked you in the second quarter of 2018 and in January 2019 to kick off the consultations to identify solutions on the financing of the public local administration, in compliance with the 2018-2020 ruling programme, but also with the Government’s previous promises.
It is for the first time in AMR’s history when our request for dialogue addressed to the Romanian Gov’t are denied,” says the association, led by District 3 Bucharest mayor Rober Negoita.
The mayors pointed out the Executive that the budget draft for 2019 had not been previously discussed, while accusing the Gov’t that they have heard from the media that the draft will be adopted by Thursday.
The association claims they’ve heard that the draft budget entails taxes of 20% to the county’s local budget, 45-50% to the local budgets of communes, towns and cities as against the requested 60% and 30-35% taxes to balance the local budgets, as against the requested 20%.
In retort, the Prime Minister has delegated Finance Minister Eugen Teodorovici to meet the mayors, as political sources told local news agencies.