Public budget in a mid size community Paper instructions will be provided. Please answer all the questions in the amount of pages. Data source is not necessary but helpful. Informations can be found and used form form the following URL http://www.semcog.

fall_2011_plsc_540_midterm_0

Public budget in a mid size community

Paper instructions will be provided. Please answer all the questions in the amount of pages. Data source is not necessary but helpful. Informations can be found and used form form the following URL http://www.semcog.org/Data/bysubject.cfm

PLSC 540 Public Budgeting Fall 2011

Imagine yourself as the city manager or budget/finance officer in a reasonably mid-sized (say 20,000 to 75,000 population) local government. Get the data on a local government unit/community online from SEMCOG.org and from its webpage if it has one. The local elected governing body of this unit has just given you a new task. The task includes: examining the current budget methods, from format to timetables to data collection to the politics of budgeting, and explaining why they are being used; giving a brief overview of other methods that might conceivably be used in your situation; and finally, to suggesting changes to the methods and procedures that will make you budgeting procedures “better.” Much of this information can now be found online. If you cannot find it, use your imagination and create it. That is, make it up, but make it reasonable. Cite your sources.

I suggest that you begin (no intro, this is a report) by briefly describing the major factors, as you see them, in your current situation that have strong (positive or negative) effects on the budget process. This might include, but not be limited to: 1) demographics – what does the overview of you population look like? What race or ethnicities make up your population? What is the average job? What is the income spread? How big is your population? How many in school? How many old people? Are you growing, static, or declining in population and why? 2) what does the geography of your district look like? Can you expand your boundaries, or are you locked in by other communities? Do you have useful or non-useful natural features? 3) What is your current major resource (tax) base and how has it changed over the years? How do you expect it to change in the future? How hard is it to predict your revenues from your base resources? Can the prediction be improved? 4) What are the major issues that require community budget expenditures (streets, safety, jobs, schools, other) and how do you expect them to change in the near future? 5) how do changes in the state or national economy affect your tax base? You don’t have to answer all these, but pick the ones you think are important. (Use your imagination. Draw on communities you are familiar with. Compare and contrast.) 6) What are the major political forces that result from all of the above? Number 6 is very, very important. And, you may want to include your estimation of the quality of both the elected and the appointed officials who will be working with you on future budgets.

The rest of your answer should follow from the preceding observations.

Next, discuss what kind of budgeting you currently use (include format, general timelines, who puts in suggestions, etc). Explain why you do it this way. (Again, use your imagination. Most budgets continue to be fashioned much as they have in the past until something forces a change.) Talk about the good and the bad points of doing it this way. Especially, discuss what sort of revenue estimating and expenditure estimating you would use, which political actors you would expect to be involved (in at least the bigger dollar areas), and what kind of compromise outcomes you would shoot for.

Third, briefly examine the formats and other potential procedures you don’t use and discuss whether or not you should try to use them. Why they might or might not work. (For instance, very small communities probably cannot afford procedures that use up many resources, even time resources.)

Finally, suggest the changes you think might help, given what you see as the political realities in your community. Imagine yourself explaining this to reasonably caring, reasonably intelligent elected representatives who are a bit afraid to change anything in ways that might upset the community, but who want to do as good a job as their community can afford.

If you describe a small community you must go into a bit more depth, if you describe a larger community you can be more general.

Think carefully before you write. There are not many wrong answers, just unsupported answers. There are a huge number of right answers. Defend the ones you choose.