I strongly believe that the village budget must be presented to the public with great detail. As a Village Department Head I was required to present my proposed annual department budget with sufficient detail to account for each cost. The Mayor, Board, and public could see each proposed expenditure and could ask specific questions about every line item.
With this kind of detail available, the public could choose to question any bit of spending placed in front of them. While it may be uncomfortable for department heads or board members to have to explain, justify or defend proposed expenditures, it was a process that encouraged trimming where prudent.
Recent budgets, however, have abandoned the specific details in favor of grouping costs under accounts. What this does is provide a total for an account, but does not break out those accounts under specific areas.
For example, in the 2003-04 budget the Clerk/Treasurer’s departmental accounts are listed individually with dollar amounts assigned to items. The public could see what the Clerk/Treasurer expected to spend on items in that department. In the 2004-05 budget the same amount of detail was provided for this department. However in the 2005-06 budget, the first budget prepared by Mayor Smith as Budget Officer, the Clerk/Treasurer’s department, for example, lumped all of the contractual services expenses under one account number and provided a total of $43,700. There was no way to easily determine from Mayor Smith’s budget exactly how much was proposed to be spent on items like mileage, office supplies, postage, and consulting fees, for example, items that previously were specifically detailed. This same manner of lumped listings with only totals shown occurred again in the 2006-07 budget. Except in that budget the total for those specific Clerk/Treasurer departmental expenses increased to $66,288. What items in that department increased in costs by $22,588? Without the specific line item numbers there was no way to tell.
All of Mayor Smith's budgets have been structured this way.
This is not a "best practice" for Seneca Falls. We must do better at providing information. We must not be afraid to let the sun shine on village operations. We cannot confidently reduce costs without detailed information.
With this kind of detail available, the public could choose to question any bit of spending placed in front of them. While it may be uncomfortable for department heads or board members to have to explain, justify or defend proposed expenditures, it was a process that encouraged trimming where prudent.
Recent budgets, however, have abandoned the specific details in favor of grouping costs under accounts. What this does is provide a total for an account, but does not break out those accounts under specific areas.
For example, in the 2003-04 budget the Clerk/Treasurer’s departmental accounts are listed individually with dollar amounts assigned to items. The public could see what the Clerk/Treasurer expected to spend on items in that department. In the 2004-05 budget the same amount of detail was provided for this department. However in the 2005-06 budget, the first budget prepared by Mayor Smith as Budget Officer, the Clerk/Treasurer’s department, for example, lumped all of the contractual services expenses under one account number and provided a total of $43,700. There was no way to easily determine from Mayor Smith’s budget exactly how much was proposed to be spent on items like mileage, office supplies, postage, and consulting fees, for example, items that previously were specifically detailed. This same manner of lumped listings with only totals shown occurred again in the 2006-07 budget. Except in that budget the total for those specific Clerk/Treasurer departmental expenses increased to $66,288. What items in that department increased in costs by $22,588? Without the specific line item numbers there was no way to tell.
All of Mayor Smith's budgets have been structured this way.
This is not a "best practice" for Seneca Falls. We must do better at providing information. We must not be afraid to let the sun shine on village operations. We cannot confidently reduce costs without detailed information.
