Parker residents interested in learning more about where the town’s money goes now have a new tool: an interactive budget complete with videos, links, photos and maps.
The town’s $129 million budget is broken down into six sections over 455 pages.
“A new focus in the book is to draw people in, to make it more than just a book of numbers,” said Kim Singdahlsen with the finance department.
The budget was unanimously approved during an April 4 meeting where Singdahlsen presented the document’s various features to the town council.
Throughout the budget book there are links to help navigate readers to different sections of the book.
The budget detail section is the biggest portion of the book and provides five-year histories, goals, an explanation of variances between previous years, accomplishments, goals and a list of full-time positions for each department.
Other sections include a budget overview; a long-range plan, which details the 10-year plan for operations and finances in the town; a revenue manual including revenues greater than $100,000; and the capital budget, which provides details on current and future capital projects such as an expansion of town hall.
“This is absolutely beautiful, this is transparent, this is easy to follow,” Councilmember Josh Rivero said during the meeting. “You don’t even have to be a numbers fan and you can get lost in here.”
Other council members also praised the budget team for their work to make the book more accessible to the public.
“I’ve been looking at budget books for 42 years,” Councilmember Cheryl Poage said. “I have never seen one that I loved like this one.”
The online budget book is available at parkeronline.org/243 and selecting “viewer” under 2022 annual budget.