Albany Dashboard

The Albany Dashboard is a new tool in providing up-to-date financial and performance data to the residents of Albany.

Launch the Dashboard

Browser Compatibility

The Albany Dashboard relies on Microsoft's SQL Reporting Services which is not 100% cross-browser compatible.

For best results use one of the following browsers:

  • Microsoft Internet Explorer (version 7 or higher)
  • Apple Safari (version 3 or higher)
  • Google Chrome (any version)

Mozilla's Firefox browser (version 2.x) works well, but with some minor issues. Mozilla Firefox version 3 is very buggy at this time.

In future versions of this tool we will address these issues as resources become available.

Clicking the Launch Dashboard button to the right will take you to our report generation system. After you select one of the City departments from the drop-down list, you can then choose the fiscal year you want, and press the VIEW REPORT button to retrieve the report.

Financial data is available from FY 2008 (FY 2007- 2008) through the current fiscal year. The information is updated every night. Anyone who wants can see the current status of the appropriations for any program in any department at any time. At a glance you can see the Current Budget, Encumbrances, Total Spent and % Used on each category of expenditure for any given program. By clicking on a category hyperlink, you can see the current detailed status of all objects that make up the category you selected.

The system also provides Performance Charting access for all programs that have measures. Available measures are shown via blue hyperlinks for measures contained in the Annual Budget, National Benchmarking, and the City’s Strategic Plan. All available measurement information is shown, regardless of the fiscal year picked for financial information.

Fiscal year 2009 actual amounts in the Annual Budget measures will be posted into the system by mid-August.

If you wish to save or print the information, from the “Select a format” drop-down list you can choose the Acrobat PDF format then click on Export to download the information to your computer.

 

Questions or Comments

If you have questions or comments about this new tool from the City of Albany, you can contact Bob Woods, Management Systems Director by e-mail or by phone at 541-917-7654.

Frequently Asked Questions

Where does the information come from?

The items in the Annual Budget section come from the Annual City Budget. The financial information you see comes directly from the City financial system. The information is current as of the last update, which is normally performed overnight.

Items in the National Benchmarks section mostly come from a performance measurement project sponsored by the International City/County Management Association (ICMA). Albany participates in this annual reporting and the measures used are based on a consistent formula used by all jurisdictions that participate, making the comparisons more appropriate. However, not all cities participate. In 2007, 193 jurisdictions participated, but not all participate in every measurement category or individual measure. Of those that participated 71 had population of 100,000 or more and 122 had population of under 100,000.

The final area, Strategic Plan, contains Albany specific objectives and measures. These measures can change from year to year as the Council decides. The measures currently shown are DRAFT measures that the Council will be reviewing in July 2009.

What kind of information am I seeing in the Annual Budget Data and how is it developed?

The information is prepared by each department as part of their budget submission to the City Council. Often, what you see are workload counts that relate to the program area. You may also see dates when specific action items are expected to be completed.

You see multiple year’s worth of information where it is available. However, you should be very careful about drawing conclusions about changes that occur from year to year. In any system there is inherent variation which occurs over time, which is a normal occurrence.

What kind of information is contained in the National Benchmarks section?

What you see is the data that Albany has contributed to national benchmarking projects, compared to the median responses from all cities who participated, on both an overall national measure, and for "Small Cities" which are those of a population of 100,000 or less.

Why are these particular measures contained in the Strategic Plan section?

Within the Strategic Plan, the City Council has set broad goals that they wish to see achieved under the categories of Great Neighborhoods, A Safe City, A Healthy Economy and An Effective Government.

For each goal in each category, departments have identified specific objectives that they intend to complete over the next five years to help achieve a specific goal. Each objective has a corresponding measure to determine whether the objective is being met.

For a clearer understanding, see the Strategic Plan.

Why are the goals and actual for some measures the same in the earlier years of the survey data?

Some of the measures are new in either 2009 or 2010, so there were no goals established in earlier years. However, departments often had the actual data from those prior years. In order to try and be consistent, and to not have the question of "Why did you have a goal of 0?", we elected to set the goal and actual as the same.

What are the various "programs" I see?

These come from the Annual City Budget and represent the various areas of service or expense within each department.

Each program represents a general area of activity, where budget appropriations are made. Some programs contain staff, operating expenses, and large purchases/projects that are considered capital purchases. However, other programs are very limited.

Programs shown begin with a 3-digit FUND number, followed by a 2-digit DEPARTMENT number followed by a 4-digit PROGRAM number. Some departments my operate in several different FUNDS.

The FUND numbers are organized as follows.

  • Series 100 General Fund Programs
    Series 200 Special Reveue Funds (restricted use revenues)
    Series 300 Debt Service Funds (Bond and loan repayment)
    Series 400 Capital Projects Funds (General projects or grant funded)
    Series 500 Permanent Funds (Trust and endowments)
    Series 600 Enterprise Funds (Sewer & Water)
    Series 700 Internal Services Funds (Charges for providing internal services to other Funds)

What do the columns of numbers represent?

The Budget Colum is the current status of the authorized budget for the group of expense shown and the program as a whole. Sometimes, the budgets are adjusted during the course of the year, often because of things like grants that are received which were not included in the original budget. The Council authorizes these budget changes, and the numbers you see is the current status.

The Encumbered column represents money that has been set aside in a purchase order to buy something, but which has not yet been paid. In large multi-year projects these encumbrances are often carried forward into the next fiscal year.

The YTD Paid column is the actual payments that have been paid so far in the fiscal year. The % Remaining column represents that amount of budget that has not been either Encumbered or Paid.

Why are some the expense categories or line items overspent? Why is that allowed?

In most cases managers are bound by the overall budget for the program, not the appropriations for the individual categories or line items. This allows managers to be flexible in dealing with changing needs during the course of a fiscal year.

Why is there no total for the entire department, only each program?

Under state law, City policy, and generally accepted accounting principles, some areas of program expense are required to be separated from others. This is accomplished by setting up a "Fund" which is like its own independent business. City governments consist of many separate "Funds".

Some city departments operate across several different Funds, so giving a total by adding all those programs together would give a false number and be misleading. It would be very difficult to sort that out in this display system, so we encourage you to go to the actual budget document or Annual Financial Report for more details.