In North Rhine-Westphalia, a municipality that uses up its reserves beyond limits set by law must draw up a Haushaltssicherungskonzept, a budget security plan. The plan must show how the budget will be balanced again by the tenth year at the latest. The supervisory authority must approve it.
Without that approval, the municipality may not publish its budget. A research institute of the University of Münster writes that such plans are part of everyday life for municipalities. In practice they are felt as “erdrosselnd”, strangling.