A review of the Haifa Municipality's budget proposal for 2026, while cross-referencing data with the City Council minutes from 2025, reveals a worrying picture of priorities. While the city administration presents a "budgetary shortage" in discussions, the numbers show a surge in senior salary costs and the accumulation of huge, opaque reserves at the expense of the most basic services for residents.
Click here to access the announcement about the 2026 budget on the Haifa Municipality website.
Click here to download the budget books
Is the mechanism bloated, is the infrastructure collapsing?
The most striking contradiction in the 2026 budget is the incomprehensible gap between the increase in the administrative apparatus and the cut in field services. The salary of the CEO's office is expected to jump from 3.4 million NIS to 6.5 million NIS – almost doubling in just two years. The Spokesperson, Branding and Advertising Division also benefits from an inflated budget of over 6.2 million NIS.
On the other hand, the one paying the price is the public space: the budget for road and sidewalk maintenance was cut by 45%, from 14.4 million NIS to only 7.9 million NIS. The insight that emerges from this is that the municipality is choosing to inflate its marketing and administrative mechanism at the expense of the most elementary needs, repairing potholes in the roads and maintaining proper infrastructure.
The "security tax" and the mysterious reserve
The municipality's revenue from the new security levy is expected to triple: from 12 million NIS to approximately 37 million NIS. This is essentially a new "security tax" that weighs heavily on the pockets of every household. Despite the increased collection, the city administration declared to the safety committees a "begging situation" that prevents the purchase of basic protective measures.
At the same time, the municipality built an extraordinary “budgetary reserve” of NIS 34 million – a budgetary “black hole” that has grown fourfold compared to previous years. The transparency of this item is questionable, especially when life-saving projects near schools, such as installing speed bumps and a new traffic light, were halted due to a lack of only NIS 120.
Neglecting safety and welfare: "The bureaucratic trap"
In the 2026 budget, the welfare sector suffers from quiet neglect. While the cost of living rises, the budget for direct actions to assist individuals and clubs remains virtually unchanged, which effectively constitutes a cut in the purchasing power of welfare services. The budget does not offer an incentive program for social workers despite the extreme workload, and abandons the centers for family and independent living.
Fire safety is also at risk: Haifa, a city prone to fires in the valleys, will see a 50% cut in the budget for buffer zones and fire prevention in 2026. This is a safety gamble on human life and property in exchange for budgetary savings that will be diverted to senior offices.
Alternative budget proposal: "The resident before the mechanism"
In light of current policy, I would like to suggest Alternative budget which proves that proper management can restore the city. The outline proposes a diversion of 31.5 million NIS From the mechanism – to the field:
- Reducing the reserve: Transfer of NIS 25 million to the benefit of Reduction of the retention levy, which will leave money in the pockets of residents.
- Administrative efficiency: Cutting 3 million NIS from the salary of the CEO's office and diverting it toRoad and sidewalk maintenance.
- Welfare priorities: Transferring NIS 4 million from the offices of deputies and spokespeople to strengthen clubs for the elderly and at-risk youth.
- Safety first: Allocation of 2 million NIS from the general reserve for "Operation Safety" in educational institutions and rehabilitation of buffer zones to prevent fires.
Summary: The problem, as always, is not money, but management.
The alternative budget proves that the Haifa Municipality's problem is not a lack of resources, but a choice to protect the bureaucratic structure at the expense of Haifa's streets and social services. Adopting the outline will allow welfare to breathe, roads to recover, and personal safety to improve, while curbing the surge in municipal taxes.
Sources:
- Haifa Municipality budget proposal for 2026 compared to the 2024-2025 budget.
- 2025 Committee Minutes from the Municipality Website
- Analysis of municipal salary and reserve items in Excel sheets of the 2025 and 2026 budgets on the municipality's website
There is no doubt that the Haifa Municipality is not doing things right. The municipality is in financial bankruptcy and on the verge of transportation chaos that will erupt in its full severity in less than 4 years when thousands of apartments will be occupied in the Pinuy Binui projects and in the Neot Navon and Mordot Freud areas. The municipality is preventing the implementation of construction in the residential neighborhoods that have been frozen for over 57 years – designated for “unification and division” since June 15, 1968 – plans for approximately 15,000 quality apartments and not the slum projects promoted by the municipality – and this without the need for public funding or even subsidies of billions of shekels from the state treasury for land and development as is customary in projects on Israeli land – plans that drain traffic from the Carmel Ridge – the city’s officials and the ruling bureaucracy prefer urban and transportation chaos in order, according to suspicion, to obtain tens of billions of shekels for transportation solutions that are not properly managed by the officials. Furthermore, the city’s officials and the ruling bureaucracy prefer to pay the owners of the frozen lands – the victims of the corrupt dictatorship – many billions of shekels – it is clear that this absurd situation cannot continue, the bubble is about to burst – there is no escape, but From the appointment of a committee called to manage the city - the current mechanism has been closing its ears for years and preventing any possibility of a fix that I have proposed in recent decades.
Thank you. What's sad for me is that this is something that for some reason we don't get out of. Even with the change of mayors.