The Greek government is facing mounting criticism from mayors across the country over a proposed law that would redirect roughly €50 million in annual traffic fine revenues away from municipalities and into police and military welfare funds. Local leaders say the move strips city governments of vital resources used to improve road safety and local infrastructure.
Athens Mayor Haris Doukas accused the government of waging a “relentless war” on local government, arguing that the measure is part of a broader effort to weaken municipal autonomy. “In a unique twist for European standards, the government is taking resources that fund road safety projects and handing them over to security force funds,” Doukas said, warning that the change would leave cities unable to finance essential works that protect citizens.
Doukas also noted that the government had recently tripled traffic fines before deciding to remove them from municipal budgets. “While claiming to care about road safety, the government deprives local authorities of the few tools they have to make roads safer,” he said.
The Athens mayor accused the government of “centralizing power” and marginalizing local authorities, citing other recent actions such as transferring oversight of the Athens Nursing Home away from the municipality and limiting the city’s role in urban planning and redevelopment projects.
According to Doukas, the traffic fine bill—introduced by the Ministry of Digital Governance—adds to a long list of policies that have reduced local governments’ authority and funding, from landfill fees to the exclusion of municipalities from managing waste and water resources. “This government cannot tolerate decentralized institutions,” he said. “Whatever it cannot control, it tries to weaken.”
The proposed legislation has also drawn criticism from the Central Union of Municipalities of Greece (KEDE). Its first vice president, Grigoris Konstantellos, mayor of Vari Voula Vouliagmeni, called the initiative “a malicious and unjustified intervention” that further erodes local self-government.
“Until now, the state has transferred responsibilities to municipalities without transferring the necessary resources,” Konstantellos said. “Now it goes a step further—assigning new duties while taking away existing revenues.”
Konstantellos warned that the law would allow future governments to determine how much, if any, of the fine revenue would return to municipalities through ministerial decrees, leaving local budgets at the mercy of political discretion. In his own municipality, he said, the loss could reach €500,000 a year—funds currently used for street lighting, road maintenance, and safety projects that “save lives.”
As Greece celebrates budget surpluses and fiscal overperformance, local officials say the central government is starving the very institutions closest to citizens. “At a time when the state coffers are overflowing, municipalities are being financially strangled,” Konstantellos said.
Local leaders are now calling on KEDE and political parties to push back against what they describe as an “orchestrated assault” on local government—and to demand that the controversial provision be withdrawn before the bill becomes law.
