Council asks staff to pursue dashboard, purchase-order system and better public reporting

During item 2d the council discussed how the city presents financial information to council and the public and directed staff to explore improvements.

Speaker 2 asked for clarity about what staff should deliver and introduced sample reports from prior cities. He said he would like a monthly report at each council meeting and the option for a public-facing dashboard where taxpayers can view spending and check registers. Speaker 2 emphasized transparency: "I am always going to err on the side of more transparency rather than less," he said.

Speaker 1 described current report mechanics: she brings monthly and weekly reports and has detailed Excel and PDF versions of the general ledger and transaction listings. She explained past credit-card coding issues (for example, conference-center decorations had been misclassified into a revenue code and she reclassified the expense). Speaker 1 said the city is moving toward Encode (commonly used in Texas municipalities) which will enable purchase-order capabilities but noted Encode alone may not provide the public-facing dashboard; that would likely require a third-party vendor and additional cost.

Council discussed a desire to correlate spending to the comprehensive plan and to make check registers and transactions available online. Speaker 1 said the books are now balanced and reconciliations have been a major focus since staff began work in March 2024. Several members called the reports "clear" and asked staff to bring a plan for implementation off the migration to Encode and timing for a dashboard and purchase-order rollout.

The council did not adopt a specific procurement or budget for such software during the meeting; staff were asked to return with options and timelines.