New elections 2025: Citizens' offices in Berlin face enormous challenges!

New elections 2025: Citizens' offices in Berlin face enormous challenges!

Frankfurter Allee, 10247 Berlin, Deutschland - The preparations for the early Bundestag election on February 23, 2025 put the Berlin citizens under pressure! With just more than three months to the election, the offices are faced with a logistical challenge that they have never experienced. Voting slips have to be provided, almost 30,000 election assistants organized and election gymnasts in schools and sports halls guarded. Time is urging, and this already has a noticeable consequences: In Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg, the citizens' office in Frankfurter Allee will close for about four to six weeks to make preparations. A closure of one of the three citizens' offices is also expected in Spandau.

overtime and appointment cancellations

Usually the district offices have up to twelve months to prepare a federal election. But this year you have to do everything in less than four months! Tim Richter, district councilor in Steglitz-Zehlendorf, describes the situation as tense: "We have sweat beads on our foreheads, but it does not presents us with insoluble tasks." In order to cope with the immense workload, overtime was arranged and vacation blocks for employees were imposed, even over the holidays. Around 5,000 appointments are deleted in Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg, but short-term appointments are to be made available for urgent concerns.

Another problem is the high amount of postal voting applications. The deputy election manager in Reinickendorf, Hauke Haverkamp, warns of an "enormous challenge" because the processing of possibly 50,000 postal voting documents will be due in just a few weeks. In order to cope with the situation, additional employees were hired and three new jobs were created in each district to support the election organization. These new elections are the first to take place under these new conditions, and time is forced!