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Long Beach launches online budget transparency center; comptroller demos interactive portal
Summary
City Controller Ina Resnick demonstrated a new ClearGov-based Financial Transparency Center during the June 17 Long Beach City Council meeting, saying the portal provides interactive, mobile-friendly access to five years of budget data and line-item detail for all operating funds.
City Controller Ina Resnick demonstrated a new Financial Transparency Center for Long Beach during the City Council meeting on June 17, saying the ClearGov-powered portal provides an interactive view of the city's budget and demographics.
Resnick said the portal is cloud based and mobile friendly and shows five years of financial data, with fiscal year 2026 shown as the adopted budget and fiscal year 2025 displayed as year-to-date operations through the end of May. "Our taxpayers want to know how their tax dollars are being spent," Resnick said. "It will allow people to go in and take a very close look at our budget, and it will show line item by line item from the budget of what goes into supplies and materials category."
The portal, accessed from the city's Transparency Center link, allows users to view expenditures by fund (general, water, sewer), by department and by object, Resnick demonstrated. She showed how a user could enter a sample property-tax payment and trace how that amount would be allocated across categories such as culture and recreation and down to specific line items such as lifeguard supplies.
City Manager Dan Creighton framed the tool as part of the administration's effort to modernize budgeting and increase public access to fiscal information. "This is a very, very useful tool for everybody that really has questions about the budget to really be able to go in and see how their tax dollars are spent line by line, item by item, department by department," Creighton said.
Resnick said the data will be updated monthly and that the controller's office will respond to questions from residents who use the portal. "If you go there, have any questions, please feel free to reach out to my office," she said.
The council did not take formal action on the portal during the meeting; staff presented it as an informational update and indicated the administration will use the tool in future budget development.
