Schönbrunn Audit Report

49% Pay Raise and Extra Bonuses for Zoo Director

The Court of Auditors also looked into Stephan Hering-Hagenbeck’s shady new aquarium construction project—and uncovered that costs are spiraling out of control.(Bild: Martin A. Jöchl)

The Court of Auditors has issued a damning report on the Schönbrunn Zoo and its owner, the Ministry of Economic Affairs: According to the report, Director Hering-Hagenbeck can do as he pleases, receives luxury allowances on top of his salary—and cuts corners when it comes to the animals as well as visitor safety.

According to its own guidelines, Schönbrunn Zoo has four missions: recreation, species conservation, research, and education. If the first detailed Court of Auditors report on the zoo under the direction of Stephan Hering-Hagenbeck since 2020 is to be believed, there is a fifth mission: raking in money—for the director, but also for the Ministry of Economic Affairs as the owner. And this mission seems more important than the actual four.

A 49 Percent Retroactive Pay Raise
It’s no coincidence that the auditors begin their report with this sentence: “Schönbrunn Zoo GmbH transformed itself from a subsidized operation into a profitable enterprise.” Until 2013, the state had to subsidize the zoo with approximately 1.5 million euros annually. Director Dagmar Schratter managed to turn the zoo’s finances around to break even. And Hering-Hagenbeck turned it into a financial cash cow—especially for himself.

The zoo is a cash cow for the director and the ministry. For now.(Bild: Mario Urbantschitsch)

As the audit report reveals, Hering-Hagenbeck’s already princely salary of 175,000 euros per year—plus a company car and official residence in Schönbrunn—was retroactively “indexed” to keep pace with inflation. The current 260,000 euros represent a 49 percent salary increase. On top of that come bonuses of up to 50,000 euros annually, either paid out at the director’s discretion without a supervisory board resolution, or for services such as “ensuring the procurement of animal feed”—in other words, a reward for making sure the animals didn’t starve.

Internal Audit Department Abolished Right from the Start
The reason cited for these lavish payments was, of all things, that Hering-Hagenbeck had also appointed himself managing director of Schönbrunn Gastronomie GmbH immediately after taking office. However, doing so—and accepting extra money for it—constitutes a clear breach of his managing director contract and the Public Employment Act. All of this was difficult to prove, as abolishing the internal audit department was one of the first things Hering-Hagenbeck implemented upon taking office.

A permanent internal audit function for the GmbH was initially not consistently staffed, and as of March 2021, it was no longer provided for within the organization.

Aus dem Rechnungshofbericht

The Court of Auditors’ examiners confirm that Hering-Hagenbeck effectively has free rein: There are no target and performance agreements, hardly any documentation or records, and not even resolutions regarding the managing director contracts and their lucrative bonuses. Why are the Ministry of Economic Affairs and the zoo’s supervisory board going along with all this (and, incidentally, violating the Limited Liability Companies Act in the process)? Perhaps simply because, according to the most recent audited balance sheet, the zoo has 34.55 million euros in the bank and thus isn’t a burden on anyone’s pocketbook. Yet.

Worst Fears About the Aquarium Confirmed
The Court of Auditors’ report confirms what the “Krone” warned about years ago: that Hering-Hagenbeck’s new aquarium construction project will become a money pit—except for his longtime business partner in their joint venture, who was awarded the contract under unclear circumstances. The Court of Auditors also notes: “There were no documented grounds for these decisions that were submitted to the supervisory board in advance or included in the meeting minutes.”

For now, all that exists of Hering-Hagenbeck’s aquarium are renderings and spiraling costs.(Bild: Tiergarten Schönbrunn)

As a reminder: The aquarium project, which Schratter had left in a fully completed state, was scrapped on the grounds that it would have cost 35.24 million euros. That alone has now resulted in 1.42 million euros in confirmed investments already sunk. The current cost estimate for the much smaller project by Hagenbeck and his long-time business partner: up to 45.72 million euros. Contrary to the original promises, the zoo cannot finance this on its own but needs a loan of at least twelve million euros.

“Key fire safety elements are missing”
It is already clear that Hering-Hagenbeck cannot build: the cost overrun for its completed construction projects to date stands at 148 percent. And there are further signs that the money won’t keep rolling in for the Ministry of Economic Affairs much longer: revenue is stagnating, and visitor numbers are declining. This trend could accelerate, as the Court of Auditors has also uncovered shocking safety deficiencies: “Key elements of organizational fire safety were either absent, insufficient, or out of date at Schönbrunner Tiergarten GmbH,” the auditors emphasize.

Cost-cutting measures affect not only fire safety—and, more broadly, the absence of any risk management—and thus visitor safety, but also the animals themselves. Under Hering-Hagenbeck, one-third fewer animals are on display than before. Relocating the fish for the new aquarium building only partially explains this. The remaining animals are also being fed cheaper food: The proportion of fresh meat, fruit, and vegetables has dropped significantly over the past four years, while hay, grain, and mixed feed have been provided in greater quantities.

The zoo also owes its well-funded account to the work of approximately 145 volunteers, who contributed 21,500 hours of work in 2024 alone. But this, too, was only discovered by the Court of Auditors’ examiners: “Their contributions were not reflected in the planning documents or the annual financial statements,” the report notes. The zoo’s explanation: The services were so valuable that they did not want to put a figure on them. The Court of Auditors can do just that: The zoo is saving on salaries equivalent to 11.8 employees. That easily amounts to a few annual bonuses for Hering-Hagenbeck.