The mayors who support, at the beginning of each year, the full payment of companion allowances/salaries of assistants to disabled people from the local budget say that in the current conditions they run out of money. The budget was not approved, and they can no longer support an expense that also falls to the state.
There is a risk that an expense that hangs heavy especially in the budget of town halls in small rural localities can no longer be sustained starting from March, which is approaching. A mayor points out that, on the one hand, he is getting close to the bottom of the bag, and on the other hand, he has already fulfilled his obligation to support 10% of the expenses for the payment of companion allowances and the salaries of personal assistants for the disabled. The problem is old and gives mayors a lot of trouble at the beginning and end of the year.
Not all years are equally difficult, but 2026 is one that seems to put town halls to the test. Higher local taxes and fees have not yet brought more money to the budget. The taxpayers either cannot afford it, or they are waiting for a miracle to happen and they will recover on the level of taxation, it is certain that they did not rush to pay at the beginning of the year. Municipalities, on the other hand, need revenues like air to be able to support expenses. After all, the last blast of winter (if it will be the last) inflates the expenses even more.
A mayor from Olt draws attention to a danger that mayors keep signaling year after year: if the mayor’s office does not have money, it will not be able to pay the salaries or allowances of the companions of the disabled, hitting a category already “executed” with the cancellation of the facility offered in the past for paying local taxes.
“After March, I don’t give them allowance anymore. I did my duty”
Even these days there is talk of a return to the legal provisions regarding local taxes and fees, with mayors from all over the country signaling that hitting an already hard-hit category – the disabled – was not the wisest decision. The state considered, in the past years, that people with disabilities should be helped, not burdened with taxes, so people with severe disabilities and those with accentuated disabilities were exempted from tax on the residence, tax on the related land, tax on a car and from paying some of the local taxes. Most people in this category live on allowances, or pensions, or social assistance, few being in a position to accumulate them or add others to these incomes.
And just as they are discussing whether to return to the measure that from 2026 they will no longer be exempt from all the above payments, another danger is signaled from the town halls: the payment for the companions of these people is in danger.
How do town halls end up limiting the rights of people with disabilities
The disability classification is carried out by a commission that operates at the level of the General Directorate of Social Assistance and Child Protection, so a structure over which the town halls have no control. This commission decides if the evaluated person is placed in one of the following degrees of disability: mild, medium, accentuated, severe. If the first three degrees (mild, medium, severe) entitle the assessed person to allowance, in the case of serious disability the person is also entitled to care. This time it is the town hall that decides whether the person designated for care will receive a companion allowance or will be employed with a work contract, becoming a personal assistant. The decision is often made with an eye on budget money, with paying personal assistants requiring larger funds.
The money for the care expenses of severely disabled people is, in theory, shared between the state and the municipality. The state promises “up to” 90%, but it doesn’t always pay in full, and the municipalities end up limiting the rights of disabled people (most of them pay allowances for companions, not salaries for personal assistants), because they can’t afford the expense either.
Each year, until the budget is approved, the expenditure is fully supported by the town halls, and if the 10%, which belongs to them of the total cost, is exceeded, the money is to be reimbursed by the state.
The mayor of the Poboru commune, in Olt county, says that it doesn’t happen exactly like that, and this in the conditions where the town hall only collects about 60% of the local taxes. “We were collecting somewhere around 60%. There are problems with the fines, I don’t pay them. Yes, someone will say – sir, there is a law for this, why don’t you take action? Well, how can you seize what? That there are a lot of people who have nothing to their name, they don’t have a job”says mayor Iulian Bărăscu.
Poboru does not live only from the fees and taxes paid by the citizens, but also receives from economic agents, one of the companies, the most important, being OMV Petrom, which has wells within the radius of the locality, so the town hall was less constrained than others to sit idly by.
However, says the mayor, if the budget delay continues, this is where the crisis will come.
“The budget will come to the mayor’s office in April, apparently. I will no longer pay disability benefits. I also told my bosses and colleagues. My colleagues supported me, they said that if I take the bull by the horns and take the first step, they will support me. I talked to many. So, the law clearly says: 10% of compensations are paid by the City Council and 90% by the government, the Ministry of Labour, who gives us the money. Well, they give us the money in the second half of the year, towards the end of the year. And until then I have to pay from the local budget. Well, I pay 2.2 billion old lei per month. I pay for January and February, which is 10% more than my share, and if they don’t give me money, I don’t pay them anymore, because with that money I have to do a lot for the rest of the community, to do something else for them. I don’t have a budget only for disabled people. I was also paying the government’s share and the government in the fall, when they were thinking, to give me back. And he didn’t give me everything, he kept giving me a spike”, says the mayor, who has now decided not to credit the state.
“After March, I don’t give them allowance anymore. Because I did my duty. 10% means January and part of February. But I give them for the whole month of February. On March 10, I give them their allowances for February. After that I don’t give anymore. Give me the money, put the money in my account, the 90% part, and then I pay it to the people. I did my duty, I explain to people”, mayor Iulian Bărăscu added.
“I make them sick, and they go shopping alone, incense at cemeteries…”
At the level of the commune, 56 beneficiaries are in a position to benefit from care, i.e. people with serious disabilities. Of these, says the mayor, “many are imagined”. “And here is a discussion. Let’s take measures with those commissions, with those doctors who give documents and make them pretend to be sick, and they walk alone on the street, go shopping, burn incense at cemeteries, and in the document it is written that he cannot eat alone, he cannot go to the toilet alone, he needs a companion.” the mayor signals.
Of the 56 files, only four are personal assistants with employment contracts. They are mothers with children with serious diagnoses, the mayor explains, cases that cannot be questioned in any case, and their families actually live on these incomes.
“You pay the salaries a little later, because you can postpone them”
In the town of Bobicești, a commune with approximately 3,000 inhabitants, also from Olt county, approximately 60 people are on the payroll.
“I talked to a lot of people about the 10% we pay from this allowance, and a lot of people said:
The burden also comes from the fact that, in the absence of an approved budget, there is a limit to the amount that can be spent monthly, until the budget is approved. “There are cases, such as this year, when we will slowly get blocked. I have not yet reached this situation, but I tell you, the other smaller municipalities, with smaller budgets, yes, they are crippled and will certainly end up being blocked”, added the mayor.
From the money that is collected, the salaries of the officials, the salaries or allowances of the attendants, the utility bills, installments, snow removal must be paid, because we are facing a genuine winter, as it has not been for a long time, etc..
And to the question “How are you doing?” the answer is slightly unexpected: “You pay your wages a little later because you can defer them. You can’t delay paying your electricity bill because it cuts your electricity. You can’t delay paying for, I don’t know, calcium chloride or diesel for snow removal and the only thing you can delay is your salary. It’s illegal, it’s true, but that’s the only thing you can delay. The penalty is still less than if you don’t pay your electricity or other bills to other collaborators. I haven’t been in this situation yet, and let’s hope I don’t end up. But they are still a commune with a little better income than the communes that are far from the city.”the mayor detailed.
The mayor says that the taxation of these people was an unfair thing that is a priority to recover. “They are the most vulnerable people. And five people if they matter. And if there are three, fight for them, because they really can’t afford to have these extra debts! They also had an exemption during the communist era. Then, so that there would be no crime, that is, for the nephew to register the car in the name of the disabled person, then it was required that the car be exempted only if it has adaptations for the disabled. I don’t know why they didn’t at least make the legislation according to that model”. the mayor also said.
Some of the taxpayers who benefited from the exemption last year have already paid their debts, and they did this, the mayor explains, to ease their situation, aiming to receive that discount for early payment.
