DEPARTMENT: Finance
DEPARTMENT HEAD: Troy Elliott, Deputy Chief Financial Officer, Finance Department
COUNCIL DISTRICTS IMPACTED: CITY WIDE
SUBJECT: Open Checkbook
SUMMARY:
The purpose of this item is to provide the Innovation and Technology Committee with an overview of a proposed method for Constituents to easily access and view the various payment amounts, billed services and associated recipients of funds that are paid out by the City of San Antonio, on a monthly, quarterly and yearly basis.
BACKGROUND:
The City of San Antonio (COSA) is exploring the creation and implementation of an innovative and digital payment registry, Open Checkbook. Open Checkbook will allow Constituents to view payments issued by COSA, which will detail the service type rendered, the associated vendor or payee, and payment period.
Constituents should have accessible, searchable and consumable access to how City dollars are being spent.
Preliminary data analysis and cleanup is in progress and being facilitated via a partnering between ITSD and the Department of Finance. We are ready to present a demonstration of the data we will be making transparent, while keeping our COSA vendor and payment data secure.
ISSUE:
The existing City of San Antonio Transparency SA portal is not comprehensive or easily consumable by Constituents. It does not include an easy to navigate method for Constituents to view how COSA money is being spent. The current system is limited to displaying payment date, payment method, vendor and amount paid. The current display of the frequency of payments and payment method exposes the City to security vulnerabilities for the risk of theft.
The Open Gov platform is being explored as a potential solution for dashboard creation, searchability and analytics for public use.
ALTERNATIVES:
This item is for briefing purposes only.
FISCAL IMPACT:
This item is for briefing purposes only.
RECOMMENDATIONS:
This item is for briefing purposes only....
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