Key Points
- Amsterdam is ending its buurtbudgetten, or neighbourhood budget programme, which allowed residents to submit ideas for local improvements and vote on which projects should receive funding.
- Mayor Femke Halsema announced the programme would be discontinued, saying it required relatively too much municipal staff capacity for the effects achieved.
- Stefanie Jansen, coordinator of Netwerk de Pijp, criticised the decision and said neighbourhood funding helped residents create projects that made local areas more pleasant.
- Jansen highlighted the redevelopment of a playground at Smaragdplein, where residents said nuisance involving young people declined after improvements were made.
- The project included new picnic tables, murals on an electricity cabinet and improvements to the climbing equipment.
- Project leader Marijke Verboom said the renovated space had become a place where residents could meet one another.
- Amsterdam had been allocating roughly €4.5 million to €5 million a year to neighbourhood budgets, according to an earlier AT5 report.
- The city says it will seek another way to spend the money, while projects already selected by residents will still be carried out.
- The future form of neighbourhood funding has not yet been decided.
Amsterdam Times News (ATN) October 7, 2026 – Amsterdam residents are expressing disappointment after the city decided to end its neighbourhood budget programme, which enabled local people to propose and vote on community improvement projects. The decision was announced by Mayor Femke Halsema last week and has prompted criticism from residents and community organisers who say the scheme supported practical improvements and encouraged people from different backgrounds to work together. Among the examples cited is a renovated playground at Smaragdplein in De Pijp, where residents say nuisance declined following the project. The municipality says the programme required too much staff capacity in relation to its effects and is now considering alternative ways to allocate the money.
Why is Amsterdam ending its neighbourhood budget programme?
Amsterdam is discontinuing the neighbourhood budget programme that allowed residents to develop ideas for their local areas and vote on projects they believed should receive municipal funding.
The decision was announced by Amsterdam Mayor Femke Halsema last week. Under the programme, residents could submit proposals for improvements in their neighbourhoods, while other residents could then vote on the ideas they considered most useful. Projects receiving sufficient support could receive funding through the neighbourhood budget system.
According to Caroline Spijkers and Justine van Overeem of AT5, the municipality has decided to end the arrangement because it required relatively large amounts of municipal staff capacity while producing effects the city considered limited.
The decision has nevertheless generated disappointment among people involved in neighbourhood projects. Community organisers argue that the programme offered residents a direct way to influence their surroundings and finance relatively small improvements that could have an effect on how public spaces were used.
Stefanie Jansen, coordinator of Netwerk de Pijp, told AT5 that funding should remain available for such initiatives. She argued that these projects contribute to making neighbourhoods more pleasant and said a wide range of people in her area had participated through local organisations.
The disagreement therefore centres on two different assessments of the programme: the municipality’s concern about administrative resources and effectiveness, and residents’ view that locally selected projects produced practical benefits within their communities.
What did Amsterdam’s neighbourhood budget programme allow residents to do?
The neighbourhood budget system was designed to give residents a direct role in deciding which local initiatives should receive funding.
Residents with an idea could submit a proposal for their neighbourhood. Other residents could subsequently vote for the proposals they supported. The projects with the most votes could then qualify for a neighbourhood budget.
This mechanism meant that funding decisions could be linked directly to local participation. Instead of the municipality deciding every small improvement itself, residents could identify projects they considered relevant to their surroundings.
AT5 previously reported that Amsterdam had been allocating approximately €4.5 million to €5 million each year to neighbourhood budgets. The system had therefore represented a significant municipal funding mechanism for resident-led initiatives.
The programme supported a range of projects. Examples included a chessboard installed through a neighbourhood budget on Frederiksplein, as well as improvements to public spaces and community facilities.
The city had already indicated before the final decision that the programme’s future was uncertain. According to AT5’s earlier report, there were no new neighbourhood budget rounds in 2026, before the municipality subsequently confirmed that the scheme would be scrapped from the following year.
The municipality is now looking for a different way to use the money.
Why are residents disappointed with the decision?
Residents and community organisers involved in neighbourhood initiatives say the programme provided more than financial support for individual projects.
Jansen told AT5 that many different people in De Pijp participated in initiatives through local organisations. Her argument was that neighbourhood budgets gave residents an opportunity to become directly involved in improving the places where they lived.
She described the decision to end the programme as a loss and argued that funding should remain available for locally generated ideas.
The concern expressed by Jansen is particularly focused on the relationship between small physical improvements and everyday neighbourhood life.
She pointed to the playground at Smaragdplein as an example of what residents believe the programme could achieve.
According to Jansen, the playground had previously been associated with nuisance involving young people. Following an initiative by several local residents, the area was changed and, she said, the nuisance subsequently declined.
The example is significant because the project was not presented simply as an aesthetic improvement. The residents involved regarded the redesigned space as a practical intervention that changed how the area was used.
What happened at the Smaragdplein playground?
The Smaragdplein playground became one of the examples used by residents to demonstrate the perceived value of neighbourhood budgets.
The project included the installation of picnic tables, murals on an electricity cabinet and improvements to the climbing equipment.
Jansen told AT5 that the playground had previously been a place where young people caused considerable nuisance. She said that after local residents initiated changes to the space, the nuisance decreased.
The project leader, Marijke Verboom, also described the result positively.
Verboom told AT5 that the renovated playground had become more than simply an improved physical space. She said it had developed into a place where people could meet one another.
The changes therefore combined physical improvements with a social purpose. The electricity cabinet was decorated, seating was introduced and the climbing equipment was improved, creating a more usable public space for local residents.
For those involved in the project, the example demonstrates why neighbourhood funding remains important even when individual projects may appear relatively small in financial terms.
Verboom also questioned what would replace the system following its abolition. While she acknowledged that operating neighbourhood budgets required considerable energy, she said she could not currently see what form the replacement arrangement would take.
What did Mayor Femke Halsema say about the neighbourhood budgets?
Mayor Femke Halsema has given administrative capacity and the perceived effectiveness of the scheme as reasons for ending it.
According to AT5, Halsema said the neighbourhood budgets consumed relatively too much municipal staff capacity in relation to their results.
An earlier AT5 report quoted Halsema as saying that the effects of the neighbourhood budgets were relatively limited and that Amsterdam’s administration had to ensure the city remained financially healthy in the coming years.
The municipality is consequently looking for another way to use the money that had been associated with the programme.
The decision does not mean that every project selected through the neighbourhood budget system will immediately disappear. AT5 reported that plans residents had already chosen will still be implemented.
The important distinction is therefore between existing approved projects and future rounds of neighbourhood funding. Projects already selected are due to proceed, while residents will no longer be able to use the existing system to submit and vote on new initiatives.
How much money did Amsterdam allocate to neighbourhood budgets?
Amsterdam had been spending approximately €4.5 million to €5 million a year through neighbourhood budgets, according to AT5’s earlier report on the decision.
The amount illustrates why the programme has become part of the wider discussion about how Amsterdam uses public money.
The municipality’s argument is not that local projects have no value. Rather, Halsema’s stated concern is that the administrative resources required to operate the programme were too high compared with the effects achieved.
The city is therefore examining how the funding can be used differently.
For residents, the question is whether an alternative arrangement will preserve the ability to develop projects at neighbourhood level. Jansen has expressed the hope that residents will continue to have an opportunity to submit their own initiatives.
The future mechanism has not yet been announced.
Will existing neighbourhood projects still be completed?
Yes. Projects that residents had already selected under the neighbourhood budget programme are still due to be carried out.
This means the decision to end the programme does not cancel all previously approved projects.
The distinction is important for residents because the municipality is moving away from the existing application-and-voting model while retaining commitments to initiatives that had already passed through the process.
The city will subsequently determine how the money is allocated under a different arrangement.
At this stage, there is no confirmed replacement system described in the AT5 reports. As a result, residents who previously relied on the neighbourhood budget mechanism do not yet have a clear alternative route for submitting and voting on new projects.
What does the decision mean for resident participation?
The end of the neighbourhood budget system removes one formal mechanism through which Amsterdam residents could influence the allocation of money for local projects.
Under the previous model, residents did not simply make suggestions. They could also vote on proposals put forward by other members of their community.
That created a direct connection between local participation and funding decisions.
Jansen’s criticism indicates that this participatory element was considered important by community organisations in De Pijp. Her comments suggest that the value of the programme, from the perspective of participants, extended beyond the individual projects that received money.
The Smaragdplein example also demonstrates the type of local issue that residents could address through the system. The project involved a specific public space and changes identified and supported by people living in the surrounding area.
The municipality, however, has reached a different conclusion about the efficiency of maintaining the programme in its existing form.
The future question is therefore not only how Amsterdam will distribute the money but also whether any replacement system will continue to allow residents to propose and influence local improvements.
What are the main arguments on both sides of the decision?
The municipality’s position is based on the resources required to administer the programme and its assessment that the effects were relatively limited.
The residents’ position is based on their experience of individual projects and their belief that neighbourhood-level participation can improve public spaces and relationships between residents.
Jansen argues that neighbourhood initiatives make areas more pleasant and bring different groups of people into local projects.
Verboom’s experience at Smaragdplein provides another example. She described the renovated playground as a place where people meet and interact, rather than simply as a collection of physical improvements.
Neither position changes the basic fact that Amsterdam has decided to end the existing programme.
The municipality is now responsible for developing another approach to the money, while residents and community organisers are waiting to see whether the replacement arrangement will preserve the ability to initiate projects locally.
What happens next for Amsterdam’s neighbourhood funding?
Amsterdam will examine other ways to spend the money previously connected to neighbourhood budgets.
The exact future model remains undecided. That leaves an immediate question for residents and community organisations about how new local initiatives will be supported after the existing system ends.
The municipality has confirmed that already selected projects will continue, but future residents will no longer be able to use the neighbourhood budget mechanism in its current form.
Jansen has said she hopes the money will still be available for residents to submit their own initiatives. Her position reflects the wider concern among participants that any replacement system should retain a meaningful role for local communities.
For the city administration, however, the replacement will need to address the concern that led to the original decision: the amount of staff capacity required in relation to the results produced.
What is the background to Amsterdam’s neighbourhood budget decision?
Amsterdam’s neighbourhood budgets operated by allowing residents to propose projects and giving other residents an opportunity to vote on them.
The system was used to fund a variety of local improvements, with approximately €4.5 million to €5 million a year allocated to the programme in recent years.
The programme’s future had already become uncertain before its final abolition. AT5 reported that no new neighbourhood budget rounds were being held in 2026. The municipality subsequently confirmed that the programme would be discontinued from the following year.
The city cited the level of municipal staff capacity required and the relatively limited effects of the programme as reasons for the decision.
At the same time, projects already selected by residents are due to be implemented. The municipality is now considering a different approach to the funding.
The Smaragdplein project in De Pijp remains one of the clearest examples cited by participants in the debate. Residents involved in that project say changes to the playground helped reduce nuisance and created a place where people could meet.
What could the decision mean for Amsterdam residents?
For Amsterdam residents who previously relied on neighbourhood budgets, the immediate effect is the loss of the existing system for proposing and voting on new local projects.
The practical impact will depend on the alternative arrangement eventually introduced by the municipality.
If the replacement allows residents to continue submitting and influencing local initiatives, some of the participatory features of the previous system could remain. If the new approach is more centrally administered, the process for securing support for small neighbourhood projects could be different.
For community organisers, the decision also creates uncertainty over how future initiatives will be financed.
The municipality’s stated objective is to use the available funding in a way that requires fewer administrative resources while producing stronger or more effective results. Residents, meanwhile, will be watching how that new model affects their ability to address issues in their own areas.
At present, the city has not announced the final replacement mechanism. The next stage will therefore be the development of an alternative funding approach and the clarification of how residents will participate in future neighbourhood improvements.
