1825: Idyll under a mountain of debt - A look at the city budget of the time
The mayor did not receive a salary. It was an honor for Peter Georg d'Orville to serve the community of Offenbach. When he drew up his first budget for the year 1825, he was not assisted by a town treasurer. A few people, including police servants, were enough to administer the community of Offenbach with its 6600 inhabitants. They didn't have to worry about a hospital, kindergartens, gymnasiums or sports grounds. Nobody expected them to provide garbage collection, a women's shelter, scheduled public transportation, sewers or even museums. Social welfare was none of the mayor's business, because charity was a matter for the churches. A town like that didn't cost much. And yet the mayor of 1825 was also burdened by debt.
We learn this from a booklet in the "Alt-Offenbach" series published by the historical society. In it, Dr. Otto Schlander takes a look at the 1825 budget in order to examine the beginnings of the town administration. For Schlander, the year 1825 is the big bang. It marked the beginning of the city administration's journey into the present.
Much was new in the first quarter of the 19th century. Offenbach had become Hessian. The new government had united the separately administered units of the old and new municipalities under a single mayor. The principle of municipal self-government was no longer contested. Only the overall supervision remained in Darmstadt. In 1825, this was the responsibility of the Grand Ducal government; today, it lies with the Darmstadt district president as the representative of the state government, which is now based in Wiesbaden.
The structures of a modern administration could therefore be guessed at, but by no means the modern orders of magnitude. According to Otto Schlander, the budget for 1825 was handwritten on nine pages. The budget today fills two thick volumes. Where d'Orville reckoned in thousands, the treasurers of our time deal with millions.
The nine pages from 1825 show a debt burden of 100,000 guilders, with tax revenue of just 12,000 guilders. How could the modest community of Offenbach pile up this mountain of debt? The industrialization that characterized the 19th century was only just beginning to take off. The town was still dominated by agriculture. There were 386 cows and 169 horses in its stables. 55 pigs were fattened and 523 sheep were put out to pasture. Had this idyllic village fallen into the hands of overconfident crammers?
Schlander finds the explanation in the burdens of war. From the French Revolution in 1789 and during the Napoleonic era until 1815, war campaigns kept the country on tenterhooks. And each warring party financed itself through contributions imposed on the stricken communities. This money could only be raised through interest-bearing loans, as public revenue remained limited. The municipality was paid for grazing rights and sold hay and wood. The import of foodstuffs was taxed. All in all, the income in 1825 amounted to 37,000 guilders, with a debt of 100,000.
Just as the mayor of 1825 was weighed down by old war costs, the treasurer of today may be burdened by social expenditure, over the amount of which he has no influence. They narrow the scope of what remains available as so-called "voluntary services". In Offenbach, for example, this still amounts to 2.2 million euros for culture and 1.8 million euros for sport. In total, voluntary services account for three percent of the total volume: a gigantic sum compared to 1825, a meagre amount compared to today's Frankfurt, for example.
Mayor d'Orville would certainly have been very impressed by the income and expenditure of his successors. To today's observer, they seem modest. Looking at this, an insight comes to mind that Otto Schlander formulated as follows: "Anyone who complains about the fees and taxes payable to the city should first think about the areas of life that are shaped by the municipality and maintained for the benefit of the citizens."
A "lean administration", as it should be understood, could only be maintained with very lean citizens without needs.Lothar R. Brown