Essay on "Public Budgeting and Finance"

Essay 6 pages (1726 words) Sources: 3

[EXCERPT] . . . .

Budgets

City of Austin's 2007-2008 Budget

This budget is quite clearly a performance budget, as it is presented according to specific programs and objectives (Lee et al. 2008). These programs are organized by city department and the hierarchy of the city's power structure as identified in charts that appear at the opening of the budget. Different programs and objectives are presented in terms of their fiscal success -- i.e. their ability to take in revenue compared to their expenditures, which though not expected to break even in most cases in the city budget still provides a general idea of budgetary health -- making overall departmental budgets and fiscal successes (or failures) somewhat more obscure. The performance budget does make year-to-year program comparisons and goal development much easier, allowing for the generation of future budgets based on past performance measures, but clouding other important factors that would also certainly be quite influential in annual budget adjustments and developments (Lee et al. 2008).

This, in part, explains the need for the abundant text that is found as a preliminary section to the Austin city budget; the performance form of the budget does not leave a great deal of room for explanation or reasoning directly alongside the individual programs themselves, so instead extensive rationales and commentary is included prior to the presentation of the budget itself. This definitely lends a feeling of cohesion to the budget that is distinctly lacking in the items of the budget themselves, but does not completely correct the issues of obscurity and confusion that the performance form of the budget generally entails, especially in this particular instance. This is in large part because the transmittal memo does not address the same specifics as the budget itself (Stenberg 2007). Though it details many of the larger fiscal challenges and revenue sources the city is facing, it speaks little of distribution.

There are some benefits to the performance budget form that the Austin city budget is presented in. It is very easy to see which individual programs are most effective -- or least effective -- at covering their own costs or even generating revenue. This is, of course, the express purpose of this budgetary form, so its success here is not exactly surprising, but the level of detail inherent to this budget is still somewhat breathtaking. It is also more than a little daunting, however, as the individual expenditures and revenues are difficult to keep track of in any larger and more cohesive sense. The successful part of the performance budget format, then, also serves as its primary weakness -- the level of detail accurately reflects each program's benefits and costs, but says little about the way the government is actually run or budgeted (Lee et al. 2008).

This makes it difficult to perceive the actual revenue and expenditures that the city of Austin presents in its budget. Though it is clear to see which programs are more fiscally effective individually, and remarkably easy to view the proposed (and possible) rates of change in the fiscal efficacy of these programs at a glance, there is no comprehensive overview of the budget provided. Revenue and expenditure programs are often completely different in public financing, and this budgetary format does not show clear links between the two necessary ends of municipal funding (Stenberg 2007). It is therefore easy to pick out instances where revenues clearly do not meet expenditures, or other cases such as those that incorporate user fees that cover the direct expenses of a program and more, but it is not possible to come to an effective understanding of the overall budget (Lee et al. 2008).

The question of the efficacy of this budgetary format must be placed in the context of the use the budget is being put to. For an average citizen trying to discern how their city's government receives and spends its money, it is not especially effective. Nor is it incredibly useful for anyone else, be they involved in the city's operation or merely conducting a study of some sort, that is attempting to achieve a comprehensive view of the city's revenue and expenditures. For individuals more intimately involved with a certain department's or program's operations, however, this budget can be very effective. It allows for quick access to succinct numbers and expectations on a per-program basis, and is highly operational. This, of course, is the intended purpose of the widespread use of performance budgets at many levels of government since the mid-twentieth century (Lee et al. 2008).

The level of detail inherent to performance budget does not preclude the inclusion of more comprehensive overviews. This would be simple enough to tabulate from the numbers already included in the budget, and could be presented with great clarity in a chart broken down by department, urgency, amount of expenditure or deficit, etc. Its lack here seems almost purposeful, as though this budget were specifically meant to only be useful for these directly involved in the city's many operations and programs, while deliberately obfuscating broader information for inquisitive outsiders. The information is all there, certainly, but it is not especially useful without extensive compilation and analysis.

City of Detroit's 2008-2009 Budget

The city of Detroit's budget is in a very different format than the city of Austin's, with a great deal more summary and a great deal less text. As explained in the preamble, the city's charter demands a balanced budget, and this is reflected in the organizing principles of the budget's construction and presentation of information. The commitment to the sustainable continuation of current programs that is highly visible in the budget marks this as a current services budgeting format, whereby the projected spending and revenue by and to each department and on/from each program is largely established by the real numbers for the same programs/departments in the preceding year, with adjustments made for perceived cost increases or savings, and revenue reductions or increases (Lee et al. 2008). The commitment to a balanced budget makes this one of the most efficient and equitable modes of perpetuating effective spending across several years (Stenberg 2007).

The reasons behind the inclusion of the budget preface in the city of Detroit's annual budget is not immediately apparent, and indeed the necessity of this preface is somewhat questionable. It does establish the general principles upon which the budget was formed, including the mandate of the city's charter that the budget be balanced and the long-standing responsibility that the city of Detroit has borne and still bears to the greater metropolitan area, county, and state. This, however, has very little bearing on the practicalities of the budget itself. Establishing the philosophical (or even the purely pragmatic) reasons behind a budget is a worthwhile inclusion only for those who approach the budget with an exceedingly skeptical eye (Stenberg 2007). The preface does provide the casual observer of this budget reasons for the lack of deficit spending, however.

The multitude of different overviews that are provided in the budget, broken down by both department and program, allow for a very easy and effective way of determining the major sources of revenue and the major expenditures of the city of Detroit. The current services budgeting plan and format allows for the simple production of a great deal of both detail and comprehensive overviews, in that much of the budget's basic shape in any given year can be derived from the preceding year's budget (Lee et al. 2008). Major changes are mitigated by the city's contribution of budget surpluses to the Budget Stabilization Fund, and in total programs that run at a deficit are covered by the city's revenue sources as mandated by the city's charter. This means that the budget stays fairly stable year after year, and major shifts in expenditure areas or revenue sources are unlikely to occur within the span of a single year, or even several years (Stenberg 2007).

The major expenditures that the city of Detroit faces are the protection of individuals and property, which includes traffic control and the police and fire department. This is not the single biggest departmental item on the budget, but it runs at the largest deficit. Its costs, and those of many other departments, are offset by the revenues generated by the development and management activities (including various tax revenues), which though a larger expenditure is also the primary source of revenue. The other primary expenditure is physical environment control, including waste removal (which operates at a balance). The costs associated with this department that are not covered by its revenues are more than offset by building and supply revenues (community redevelopment fees and taxes).

This budgetary format is far more effective than Austin's both for city officials and planners, and for others who have an interest in the way Detroit earns and spends its money. Not only does it provide a near-automatic understanding of budgetary changes from one year to the next (as these changes are purposefully minimized ) in each department and for many… READ MORE

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