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Finance proposes OpenGov software to centralize budgeting and grants; staff recommend funding one-year rollout from reserves

Pocatello City Council · November 13, 2025
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Summary

Finance and planning staff recommended adopting OpenGov’s budgeting and grants-management modules to improve budget accuracy, grant tracking and public transparency. Staff estimate a multi-month implementation, say finance reserves can fund the first year, and noted the solution is used by Idaho agencies including the state controller.

City finance and planning staff presented a proposal to adopt OpenGov budgeting and grants-management software to replace portions of the current Excel-driven budget and grant tracking workflow.

Staff said the software provides a collaborative budgeting environment, interactive public-facing budget books, five-year analyses, variance alerts, grant lifecycle tracking and GFOA-aligned reporting. “OpenGov has offered scalability, flexibility, and expanded our process for reporting requirements,” the finance presenter said. Christine Howe (grants manager) noted the city currently tracks about 66 grants totaling roughly $54 million and that improved centralized tracking would reduce single-audit risk.

Staff described implementation as a multi-month effort (estimated 3–4 months for a single solution, roughly 6 months for both budgeting and grants), integration via API with the city ERP, enterprise-grade security (SOC 2 Type II, AWS backups) and unlimited user licensing. Finance has reserves available (staff reported approximately $343,000) and plans to propose a budget amendment in December to fund first-year costs; ongoing costs would be moved into the IT interfund allocation in subsequent years.

Council questions focused on public transparency (which dashboards would be public), whether grants would be shown on the public portal, integration with the state’s Transport Idaho initiative, and how interfund transfers would be clarified. Staff said dashboards are customizable, grant visibility can be included if council chooses, and the state controller’s office and other Idaho jurisdictions use the product.

Ending: Finance will return with a budget amendment and contract details for council consideration; staff said they would aim to implement the budgeting and grants modules in a phased manner if council approves.