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Clark County Budget Director outlines office role, timeline and software tools ahead of 2026 cycle
Summary
Budget Director Emily Swetzik briefed the Clark County Council on the Budget Office’s mission, staffing, key funds it manages, the annual budget timeline, supplemental policy and the office’s use of Questica budget software and internal resources.
Emily Swetzik, Clark County’s Budget Director, gave the County Council a concise overview of the Budget Office’s role, staffing and tools during a March 19, 2025, work session.
Swetzik said the office’s “mission to develop and maintain a fiscally sustainable budget that implements county council priorities” and described its three core functions as planning, preparing the technical budget and monitoring what the council adopts. “It is our goal and it is our requirement to stay within the state mandated requirements,” she said.
The briefing detailed how the Budget Office supports the county manager, departments, elected officials and advisory boards year-round. Swetzik said the office directly manages forecasting and advisement for several specific funds including the county’s mental health sales tax fund, the public safety sales tax fund and REIT-related funds, and coordinates fund management with the Auditor’s Office.
Swetzik described the office as a five‑full‑time‑employee team that has held roughly the same staffing level for eight years with a single FTE added previously. She said the team brings collective institutional experience: “collectively this group has 82 years of public service in the county,” and she noted a recent hire from the district court was on her third day in the office.
On process and schedule, Swetzik said work on the 2026 budget has already begun, with departments formally engaging in May, the budget opening for changes in July, submission deadlines in August, the county manager’s recommendation in September and October, and final adoption in December. She described supplementals as an allowable mechanism for unforeseen needs but said policy guidance is to limit supplementals to one per year in the fall except when early‑year technical capital adjustments are required to align recently adopted master plans.
Swetzik also described change requests as the formal vehicle for new funding or permanent headcount changes. She told the council that the 2024 fall supplemental included 45 change requests and that the annual adopt included 303 change requests, a number she said has risen each year.
The Budget Office manages the county’s Questica budget software (now under Unit4/Unitsolutions) and provides full administration for the system, with limited IT support required for ERP integrations such as Workday. Swetzik said about half of her staff time supports Questica modules including operating, personnel, capital and a digital budget book. She pointed council members to internal resources on ClarkNet and a public budget page dating to 2013, plus a new Questica-powered budget dashboard that shows the adopted snapshot by department, fund and revenue source.
Councilor Young thanked Swetzik and the team, saying they had built trust during Young’s two years in office and that budget oversight was not a personal concern because of the office’s work. Swetzik closed by encouraging council members to review the dashboard and other materials.
The presentation included no formal motions or votes.
