On Monday, December 20, the Village Finance Director unveiled the 2022 Pleasant Prairie Budget Book that Village Staff put together during the 2022 budget process. The agenda item announced the launch of a new website based budget book that residents can view at
PleasantPrairieWi.gov/Budget. The Digital Budget Book is powered by ClearGov, a cloud based budget and performance management software provider for local governments.
The 2022 Digital Budget Book link is published on the Village of Pleasant Prairie website for residents, businesses, and guests to view. The website presents Pleasant Prairie's financial data in an intuitive, mobile friendly format with more manageable navigation than traditional PDF or printed budget books. Visitors interacting with the Digital Budget Book can quickly review Village finances using tables and graphs that make complex financial data easier to understand.
"I am pleased to introduce this modern website-based budget book that makes Village financial data easy to understand," said Kathy Goessl, Village Finance Director. "The new software is helping the Village take an important step towards educating and explaining local government finances to the public."
The Digital Budget Book has five sections, Introduction, Budget Overview, Fund Summaries, Departments, and Capital Improvements. These sections provide areas where Village staff can provide context to explain and clarify budget items. The published data communicates the approved 2022 budget. For the 2023 budget, Village staff intends to use the Digital Budget Book as a communication tool throughout the budget process. The vision behind the new software is to provide the community with a better understanding of how the Village utilizes tax dollars. The Digital Budget Book delivers another level of transparency, demonstrating how the annual budget impacts community services and shows the public how tax funds are allocated and used to preserve community investments.
"I am proud of all the Village departments for the time they spent preparing this new digital solution," said Nathan Thiel, Village Administrator. "The adoption of the new software helps the Village be more transparent and engage with the community. I encourage residents to visit the Digital Budget Book, so they can see how their tax dollars are being utilized and put to work."