Council hears citywide supplemental budget requests including finance software and staffing needs

Freeport — During a special City Council meeting in August 2025, department directors presented supplemental budget requests for fiscal 2025–26 covering finance and IT, human resources, building permits, museum maintenance, parks and recreation, and the golf course.

Finance and records: Finance Director Ashley Hurst asked the council to approve a one-time implementation fee and recurring costs to transition the city’s financial software to a web-hosted (cloud) deployment and to subscribe to OpenGov for budgeting and public financial transparency. Hurst said the current on-premises system prevents staff from running reports in meetings and blocks access outside the office. She presented a package that included a waived implementation fee from the software vendor for the hosting transition, a recurring hosting fee ($27,221 recurring), a $3,470-per-year project-accounting module (available only if hosted), and a discounted OpenGov implementation fee of…