The City of Newport announced today the launch of a new digital platform powered by OpenGov that provides residents, elected officials, and staff unprecedented access to the city’s finances and performance information.
The OpenGov platform transforms complex financial data into an interactive, digital format that enables better analysis and understanding of the city’s finances. The intuitive design makes it easier to explore how taxpayer money is collected. The platform may be accessed at https://newportky.opengov.com.
The OpenGov platform displays three years of government spending and revenue detail in a user-friendly portal. Users can view historical revenue and expenditure trends over time and explore multiple views of financial data, including by fund, department, expense, or revenue type. The current year report provides insight into spending and revenues year-to-date.
For example, visitors to the platform may answer frequently asked questions such as “What did the city spend on Police and Fire protection over the past 3 years?” or “How much did the city collect in property or payroll tax?”
“This financial transparency tool allows citizens to educate themselves about the City’s finances right from their own computer or device. We expect this information platform to increase understanding of how our city runs and reduce staff time spent on creating reports and answering various financial questions,” said City Manager Tom Fromme.
OpenGov is increasingly being used as a transparency tool in Northern Kentucky. Boone County, the City of Covington and Kenton County are among those who have adopted the platform to provide information to constituents.
“OpenGov allows our community to dictate their own level of involvement in the local government finance and budgeting process,” Newport Mayor Jerry Peluso said.
Beyond sharing information with the public, Newport can also use OpenGov internally to create custom reports, manage operations to budget, and keep administrators informed. With today’s launch, Newport joins a growing list of more than 1,000 leading cities, counties, state agencies, school systems, and special districts across the country that leverage OpenGov technology.
“By making its financial data easily accessible in an intuitive, digital format, the city is demonstrating its commitment to efficient, data-driven and open government,” commented Zac Bookman, CEO and co-founder of OpenGov.
Additional reports and data will continue to be added over time. One next step is to make use of the OpenGov Checkbook where visitors can quickly view and search thousands of expenditure transactions.
