The districts get a few million kroner each, you. Working class victory is near! – Dagsavisen
It always is so cozy when the budget negotiations are finished in Oslo.
The City Council of the Labor Party, the Socialist People’s Party and the MDG have long ago presented their budget for the capital, but then, quite late in the autumn, they have to sit down with the support party Red, to get a majority.
Then Rødt gets a number of millions of kroner to spend on good causes. Exactly how much money they get is of course a matter of negotiation. If Red wants to make the other parties really are the only ones in, they get more, and if it is pure Red cases, they get less. It can be easier to get investment money than operating money (because you can borrow money for investment, while operations you have to cut into something else to afford). And things like that. But it’s well inside the most delicious side of a hundred million. It always is, and also this year.
And with that, cozy things happen.
This year’s store charm bomb were the artificial turf pitches at Romsås and at Grefsen. The special conditions on the latter, Nordre Åsen, have created a lot of anger in Oslo football in the last year, after the municipality has had an artificial turf laid there that does not look in the moonlight, and football can not be played regardless of lighting conditions.
That probably gives Rødt some new followers in Skeid-land. The club has moved up to the Obos league this autumn and is probably extremely pleased that they now finally get a new mat, delivered on a silver platter by Rødt.
The city’s rheumatologists can also give an appreciative nod in Rødt’s direction. Although five million kroner is just enough money to rent a small private pool capacity, therapy baths are long awaited for those who need that.
Together with the Sami kindergarten Cizáš, which gets almost a million to secure a position, and Søndre Nordstrand gets itss when it goes five million for the rehabilitation of Ingierstrand bath.
[ Striden om kunstgressbanen på Nordre Åsen har levd lenge. Og prisen har vært høy ]
Men keep money is it not. Not even those who go to organizational life, who always have to share Red out of a little money in the budget. This time it goes a few hundred to other among Jussbuss, Mental Health Youth, Stiftelsen Sex og Samfunn and Oslo Døveforening. Det Andre Teateret gets half a million, and Sub Scene gets a quarter. And that’s how we can keep up.
But the big money they use Red for terribly boring things.
The neighborhoods, for example. 50 million, approximately, Oslo’s fifteen districts will share. It will be a little over three million kroner on each of them, which on average has well over one and a half billion in the budget already. If each of the employees in the districts is to get a coconut bun as a Christmas bonus, the money will soon be eaten up. This is how you make big money for small money.
Otherwise, 58 million goes to more employees in the home service. There can quickly be three or four employees in each district, and nothing to look forward to. Together with almost one hundred million kroner for universal design, especially in public transport and at school, it is something that can mean something to people.
But it is not exactly the smell of revolution, you can recognize through frozen and omikron-worried Oslo nostrils this winter.
No, Rødt’s shop victory under the city council of Raymond Johansen has been kindergartens. In the autumn of 2015, the city council and Rødt announced a brand new cooperation agreement, where they were the only ones to make a special emergency stop for commercial kindergartens in the city. It was visible, important and left a real mark on Oslo’s development.
After the 2019 election, they drop cooperation agreements. Thus, Rødt’s only important breakthrough during the year is for the budget. And thus it becomes cozy. And nimble. But it will not be particularly groundbreaking or revolutionary.
[ Kom du hit fordi du ville lese om Oslo-fotball? Vel, sjekk ut podkasten Trikkeligaen i stedet! ]
In Copenhagen is there’s a left-wing party called the Quiet Revolution. Actually. They regret that there are not very many votes in the election last month, despite the apparently glorious view of the room. Red, here in Oslo, is far bigger. But then maybe a cozy revolution is also better than a calm one. After all.
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