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Paducah unveils Open Finance portal as budget season begins
Summary
City controller Lauren Delaney demonstrated the city’s new Paducah Open Finance portal, showing interactive views of revenue and expenditures, historical years back to 2023, and links to budget books and audit reports to boost public transparency ahead of May–June budget actions.
Lauren Delaney, the city’s newly introduced controller, demonstrated the Paducah Open Finance portal during the March 24 meeting and urged commissioners and residents to use the tool while the city prepares its budget.
"This tool is available on the city's website and updates automatically each week," Delaney said, walking the commission through how to drill into funds, switch visualizations and view both actuals and revised budgets. She showed that users can examine revenues by fund, expand to specific revenue types such as property taxes and payroll license categories, and access the city’s budget books, audit reports and popular annual financial reports via the portal’s reports menu.
City manager and budget staff said the portal will be part of an expanded engagement plan during the budget season; commissioners were encouraged to meet individually with staff and to use the portal when answering constituent questions. Staff noted the portal contains data back to fiscal year 2023 and includes both graphical and table views to aid public understanding.
The city said it will consider additional outreach tied to property‑tax mailings and community classes to help residents navigate financial information. The portal demonstration preceded the budget‑message schedule the manager outlined for May and a planned adoption in June.
