The City Council has approved the budget proposal of Modiin Maccabim Reut Municipality for 2021. The budget will be approximately NIS 708 million, which is an increase of approximately 5% compared to 2020.
On Wednesday, 4 November 2020, the City Council approved the budget proposal of Modiin Maccabim Reut Municipality for 2021. The municipality's budget will be NIS 708 million, NIS 31 million more than the 2020 budget, which is an increase of 5% compared to last year’s budget which is estimated at NIS 677 million.
In building this year’s budget, the effects of the outbreak of the corona virus on the municipality's budget were taken into account.
In addition, emphasis was placed on upgrading the city’s innovation system, promoting computer systems and continuing to invest in the education system. More than 51% of the municipality's total budget is invested in education.
The city's budget was presented by the mayor of Modiin Maccabim Reut, Haim Bibas, and the City Treasurer, Yaniv Amos, at a special meeting held on Monday, November 2, in the presence of council members.
At the meeting, Bibas presented the budget targets, set in accordance with the municipality's goals led by the mayor: The main subject in the municipality's budget, as every year, is education.
Another emphasis for 2021 is the implementation of innovative, safe and smart management methods within the framework of promoting the Smart City, which includes, among other things, control and monitoring systems in various fields.
Emphasis will also be placed on upgrading the service system for residents and provide accessibility to the public through advanced technological means, through remote access. This will enable the municipality to act efficiently and quickly while saving resources.
As stated, at the top of the list of priorities, as in every year, is the field of education which will receive more than half of the municipal budget, about 51.6%. In total, the education budget grew from NIS 350.6 million last year to NIS 365.5 million this year, an increase of NIS 14.9 million (4.2%).
The increase in the education budget is allows for the employment of more staff to work in the special education system. This increase reflects the city’s measures to ensure that all children, including those with special needs, are provided with the services they require.
As part of the work plan, the Education Administration will continue to improve and upgrade the various areas of education, while emphasizing provision of an individual response to each student as part of his studies, and continuing to promote programs to improve matriculation figures, including increasing the number of students taking 4 and 5-point exams.
The municipality will continue to promote the reduction of the number of students in classrooms, and to increase the number of students taking matriculation exams.
Another area in which the municipality has chosen to invest heavily in the past year - and will continue this year - is the issue of innovation, which was greatly impacted by the pandemic as it led to a vast reduction in frontal services for residents and huge increase in digital services.
At the top of the list is the building of the municipal command and control center that collects and provides data in real time around the various areas of the city, including corona morbidity, noise and air pollution, monitoring of infrastructure and public works and so on.
This area includes programs to improve service in the various municipal departments with an emphasis on providing digital solutions to residents, including the city's fiber optic network that will generate 1 gigabyte of Internet infrastructure (ten times faster than the current rate).
The innovation projects will be led by Ofek Administration, in collaboration with the Computer and Information Systems Technologies Division and the Strategic Unit, which will work together to lead processes to streamline digital service for residents within the Smart City framework.
In the area of improving the city, in line with continued growth in the development of the city, Nofim neighborhood is in the advanced stages of construction. The number of landscaping and ornamental areas in the city is increasing, as are the costs of using water (an increase of NIS 3 million compared to last year) as well as an increase in garbage removal costs (about NIS 1 million).
The Social Services Division, whose budget has increased to NIS 46.7 million (an increase of about 10.1%), will this year deal with the effects of the corona outbreak, emphasizing support and assistance for the elderly and economically disadvantaged families, residents with various disabilities, single parents, new immigrants, and at-risk youth. In addition, during the year, the municipality will open four new positions in this department.
In addition, the sports department, that has operated so far within the framework of the Sachlabim Association will be transferred to the municipality, within the framework of the 2021 budget, under the leadership of the new director of the department, Adi Deutsch.
In the field of culture and leisure, the municipality has maintained a similar budget with the aim of holding a variety of activities and events for youth, young people, retirees and the whole family, depending on the consequences and effects of the pandemic.
City Treasurer Yaniv Amos said, “Building the budget this year was particularly challenging because of the financial uncertainty that characterizes this period, the absence of a government budget and in the shadow of the Corona virus' effects on the economy in general and the city budget in particular.
Despite this, the municipality continues the upward trend in the municipal budget and continued increase in municipal revenues from independent sources, with an emphasis on non-residential property taxes, which will constitute about 43% of total municipal revenues from property taxes.
