The Senate has approved a new funding system for the city of Bremen. This system restructures the funding of the 27 childcare providers receiving reference value funding, with an annual budget of nearly €220 million. From January 1, 2028, these providers will receive their subsidies based on a new calculation method.
The reform aims to better align funding with children's needs, make financing more transparent, and provide providers with greater planning security. The reorganization implements a mandate from the 2023 coalition agreement. It was developed jointly with childcare providers and their umbrella organizations.
The Senator for Children and Education, Mark Rackles, explains: “In the future, childcare funding in Bremen will be more closely aligned with the needs of children. Where more support is required, there will also be more staff. This strengthens our childcare centers, particularly in neighborhoods facing significant challenges. At the same time, providers will have more flexibility to offer smaller groups and high-quality care. This will benefit children, families, and childcare teams.”
What's changing
Currently, around 800 children with special needs receive additional hours of specialist support. In the future, all approximately 3,500 children will benefit from this – regardless of which daycare center they attend. Under the new system, each child will be provided with twice the usual number of pedagogical staff, giving providers the flexibility to reduce group sizes or increase staffing levels in groups with children requiring special support.
The social situation of the neighborhood will also be given greater consideration. Previously, daycare centers only received additional staff resources if their social index was above 50. This fixed threshold has been eliminated. In the future, the needs of each individual child will be the determining factor. This means that daycare centers below this threshold can also receive additional staff hours.
Furthermore, different support needs can now be combined. For example, if a child has special educational needs and lives in a socially disadvantaged area, daycare providers can take both needs into account when allocating staff. Previously, additional resources were primarily tied to the type of facility, such as regular, index-based, or specialized daycare centers.
An additional 1,070 euros annually per child with language support needs
Language support will also be more strongly integrated into regular daycare funding. For every child required to participate in a language support program, an additional €1,070 per year per child will be provided as part of the regular funding – for example, for additional staff and learning materials – as part of the quality initiative. A separate application for these municipal funds will no longer be necessary. This simplifies the process for daycare providers and allows them to address children's language support needs more effectively. Externally funded language support programs will remain unaffected and will continue to be supported as individual projects.
Funding for material costs will be increased
The funding for operating costs will be increased to the level of Hamburg. This includes, among other things, ancillary rental costs, housekeeping, catering, specialist advice, and management. The individual cost components will be clearly defined so that the funding can be adjusted annually to reflect price developments. Rents will continue to be financed regardless of the number of occupied places. This ensures that childcare providers do not bear any short-term financial risk if not all places are temporarily filled. At the same time, this measure aims to prevent the premature abandonment of childcare facilities that have been created at great expense in recent years.
Given fluctuating birth rates and the continuing need for childcare, Bremen needs sufficient flexibility to respond to increasing demand. However, long-term vacancies should not be funded. Therefore, childcare providers coordinate their available places annually with the Senator for Children and Education.
Greater transparency and planning certainty
The previous reference-value financing system had become complex and opaque over the years. Price and tariff increases were not consistently and systematically taken into account. The new financing system aims to close these gaps and reduce the workload for providers and administrators. It divides financing into five cost categories: rent, maintenance and investments, pedagogical staff, operating costs, and language support. Personnel and operating costs will be regularly adjusted to reflect tariff and price developments and are mutually offsetting, thus ensuring that providers have sufficient flexibility within their local structures to organize the most effective and efficient operation of their childcare centers.
The calculation process is also simplified: A clear cost sheet will determine the funding based on the number of children in care, their weekly care hours, their respective support needs, and the size of the daycare center. This will reduce the number of individual applications and calculations required.
This is how the financing is calculated
The basis for funding is the number of staff hours per child. This depends on the duration of care and the type of service offered. These hours remain essentially unchanged in the restructuring, as they correspond to the levels used in Hamburg and Berlin. For example, approximately two and a half times as many staff hours are allocated for children in crèches than for children in preschool. Additional allowances may be added for children with social disadvantages or special educational needs.
The calculation is based on 80 percent qualified educators and 20 percent qualified social education assistants or childcare workers in the early childhood education and after-school care sectors. In the infant care sector and in mixed-age groups, the ratio is 65 to 35, because caregiving and relationship-building work plays a significantly more important role there. The higher pay according to TVöD SuE 8b for educators in previously social index-based daycare centers and in groups with more than 15 percent children with special needs will remain in place.
Financing from the existing budget
The projected funding requirement for the affected providers is €218.6 million. The reform will be financed from the existing budget of the Senator for Children and Education and is not intended to place an additional burden on the overall budget. The new system will allow for a more targeted use of existing funds and correct previous misallocations. Furthermore, the model takes into account the financial flexibility resulting from declining birth rates.
For providers who may initially receive less funding due to the changeover, transitional solutions for the years 2028 to 2033 will be developed and submitted to the Senate for a decision.
More reliable support through a bonus mechanism
By the end of 2027, a concept for a reliability bonus mechanism is to be developed as part of the quality initiative. Daycare centers with particularly reliable childcare will be financially rewarded. They can use the bonus flexibly for additional staff or material expenses. An initial sum of €100,000 per year is earmarked for this purpose. Furthermore, the feasibility of providing targeted support to daycare centers with a particularly high number of staff absences will be examined to improve the reliability of their services.
What happens next?
The new financing model is scheduled to start on January 1, 2028. Implementation of the new system will be further developed in 2027. Subsequently, it can serve as the basis for the further development of financing for parent associations and daycare centers in Bremen. Daycare planning will be adjusted to reflect changes in the number of children by 2034. The goal is to plan childcare places according to demand while simultaneously maintaining sufficient flexibility for increasing demand.
The procedures for determining eligibility for funding are also to be made faster and simpler. The responsible departments, including the Senator for Labor, Social Affairs, Youth and Integration and the Senator for Health, Women and Consumer Protection, are jointly developing shorter approval processes so that funding measures can begin more quickly.
Following the Senate's decision, the independent providers will be consulted in a special session. Subsequently, the Committee for Children and Education will deliberate on the matter on November 17, 2026, the Youth Welfare Committee on November 26, 2026, and presumably the Budget and Finance Committee will make the final decision on December 4, 2026.
Factsheet daycare financing system (pdf, 11.9 MB)
Source: New daycare funding: More support for children with special needs – Senate Press Office, 27.10.2026
