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Forest Park officials tout finance awards, new transparency dashboard and city center plan
Summary
City Manager Clark and Finance Director John Wiggins reported a certificate of achievement for financial reporting, a national procurement award, plans for a public budgeting dashboard and a 100,000-square-foot city center slated for fourth-quarter groundbreaking; Planning staff also said the PCD Tyler system will open publicly after testing.
Finance Director John Wiggins reported performance items for the fiscal year ending in June, including a reported annual tax collection rate of about 93.55 percent. Wiggins said the accounts payable unit issued 499 checks in June, of which 257 were regular checks and 211 were processed through ACH.
Wiggins told the Ward 1 meeting the finance department is in the process of receiving a certificate of achievement for excellence in financial reporting and that the procurement department received a national procurement award.
City Manager Clark framed the department achievements as part of an “operational efficiency” effort and announced the city will launch a public reporting dashboard to display budget numbers, contract expirations and capital projects. “Next Monday…this government will be the first in Clayton County to actually have a reporting dashboard that reports where our budget numbers are, where our contracts are, what are the contracts that are expiring, as well as what are some of those capital projects that are coming down the pipeline,” Clark said.
Clark also updated attendees on a city center project: the city center is “completely finished” in design, undergoing value engineering and is slated to break ground sometime in the fourth quarter of the year; he described it as about 100,000 square feet to house city departments under one roof.
Why it matters: The finance recognitions and the planned transparency dashboard are presented as part of an administrative push to improve efficiency and public access to financial and contract information. The meeting included performance metrics (tax collection rate and check counts), but did not include a full audited financial report in the transcript.
Other details recorded - Tax collection rate: approximately 93.55% for the fiscal year ending June (Finance Director John Wiggins). - Accounts payable checks issued in June: 499 total; 257 regular checks; 211 ACH payments. - City budget referenced by City Manager Clark as $48,000,000 (quoted as the city’s largest budget). - The city plans a public transparency dashboard launch and a city center project targeted for Q4 groundbreaking.
What was not recorded: The transcript did not include the city’s audited CAFR, the procurement award documentation, a formal budget vote in the Ward 1 meeting, nor procurement contract details.
