Stuttgart (dpa / lsw) - The Baden-Württemberg municipalities expect longer processing times as a result of the housing benefit reform. The Executive Board Member of the Association of Cities, Ralf Bross, said on Thursday in Stuttgart: "Despite all efforts, a backlog of applications cannot be avoided." The number of newly added beneficiaries will in all probability triple. At least 160,000 households are expected, which will not happen without delays because additional staff cannot be hired at short notice and the existing personnel capacities on site are tight.
More households are to be relieved from January with a state rent subsidy: up to 1.4 million more households in Germany are to be added to the 600,000 housing benefit households so far. The housing allowance is also to be increased by an average of 190 euros per month. This means that eligible households receive an average of around 370 euros per month. Households that do not receive social benefits but still have little money can apply for housing benefit.
Housing Minister Nicole Razavi (CDU) said that the reform is expected to result in a high workload in the housing benefit authorities in the first half of the year. The state and municipalities would do everything together to keep the expected longer processing times and the resulting late payments within limits.
The chief executive of the district council of Baden-Württemberg, Alexis von Komorowski, said it was all the more important that the housing benefit authorities could both grant advances and make provisional payments. And community council president Steffen Jäger emphasized that the housing benefit reform also shows the fundamental problem: "The questions of feasibility and implementation are not addressed enough by the legislature."
