The Spata–Artemida Municipal Council will meet on Wednesday 21 October at 17:30, via videoconference, with a single item on the agenda: the 7th amendment to the 2026 budget. The motion has not yet been published. However, the previous amendment, the 6th, shows how much leeway remains. Following its adoption on 8 September, the budget reserve fell to €3,768.52.
Six changes since March
A budget revision is defined as an amendment to the budget during the financial year. Funds are transferred from one budget line to another, new revenue items – such as grants – are recorded, and new budget lines are created for expenditure that had not been foreseen. This year, the first budget amendment was published on the ‘Diafania’ transparency portal in early March, the second in April, the third in May, the fourth in July, the fifth in August and the sixth in September. The seventh is due in October. Last year, the seventh amendment for 2025 was approved at the end of the year and published on 12 January 2026.
The budget is based on last year’s available funds
Following the sixth budget revision, the 2026 budget forecasts revenue of €53,304,365.97 and expenditure of €66,190,341.81. The shortfall of €12.89 million is covered by the cash reserves held by the municipality on 31 December 2025, namely €12,889,744.36. Any surplus constitutes the reserve: €3,768.52 out of a budget of 66 million. Following the fifth budget revision in August, it stood at €6,248.52.
In practice, any new expenditure resulting from the 7th budget revision must be funded from another budget line or covered by new revenue, such as a grant.
What did the Council add to the proposal?
The department had proposed changes for the 6th budget revision that left a reserve of 59,948.52 euros. The approved decision includes five further items of expenditure, totalling 87,980 euros. €52,080 is allocated to stamped flooring at the ‘Faya’ of St Peter and St Paul in the Spata Municipal Unit. €20,000 is allocated to ready meals for the ‘Help at Home’ scheme, and €11,800 to the rent for the 4th Primary School of Artemida. A further €3,100 will go towards electronic invoicing and €1,000 towards the expansion of the municipal street lighting network.
To raise the funds, the budget line ‘Construction and repair of the road network in the Artemida Municipal Unit’ was reduced by 31,800 euros, from 300,000 to 268,200 euros. The remaining 56,180 euros were drawn from the reserve fund.
Six new codes worth 37,200 euros
The same decision cancelled two major budget lines for cleaning products. One was for €124,000 for ‘other hygiene and cleaning supplies’ and the other, under the Ministry of Education, was for €136,400 for ‘cleaning and personal hygiene supplies’. In their place, four new budget lines were created: one for the Spata Municipal Unit, one for the Artemida Municipal Unit, one for primary education and one for secondary education. Each has exactly 37,200 euros. The budget for cleaning products under these budget lines has thus fallen from 260,400 to 148,800 euros. Two further new budget lines were also opened with the same amount of 37,200 euros: one for the supply and installation of lightning conductors and one for the pre-earthquake inspection of municipal buildings.
The €37,200 is €30,000 plus 24 per cent VAT. This is the upper limit set by Law 4412/2016 for direct award, that is, for a contract awarded without a tender procedure. The same law prohibits splitting a contract into smaller parts to avoid a tender process. The decision does not explain why the cleaning supplies were divided by municipal district and school level. Whether these are separate procurements or a single contract split into parts will become clear from the award notices once they are published on the ‘Diafania’ transparency portal.
What else has changed?
The budgets for bin liners (20,000 euros), for cleaning supplies for the Social Grocery Shop (€20,000), for essential items for the needy (€30,000) and for bin cleaning detergents (€7,500) have been set to zero. The wages of hourly-paid staff have increased from 205,000 to 225,000 euros, and the fees of solicitors and notaries from 70,000 to 85,000 euros. A new budget line of 24,800 euros has been allocated for toys in nurseries. A grant of 26,580 euros has also been included for natural disaster allowances, with the same amount recorded under both revenue and expenditure. As it was approved in September, it does not relate to the October’s bad weather.
The 6th amendment was passed by a majority. Municipal councillors Myrto Tsigkouli and Vasileios Dimitrios Gorgomytis voted against it. Anna Raftopoulou, Dimitrios Botziolis, Eleni Tsakali, Nikolaos Krokos and Eleni Fragou abstained, having issued a statement to that effect.
What to look out for on Wednesday
With reserves below 4,000 euros, the 7th budget revision will reveal where the Council is sourcing the funds for any new projects it adds. It will also reveal whether project codes are being cut again, as was the case with the Artemida road in September. The meeting is being held via videoconference. We will report on the changes as soon as the decision is published.
Source: Municipality of Spata–Artemida, Municipal Council Decision 115/2026 (6th amendment, meeting of 8 September 2026, corrected version, Diafania 14/09/2026); Decision 110/2026 (5th amendment, Diafania 6 August 2026); notice of the 22nd meeting, ref. no. 85016/16 October 2026.
