For a city, being in good financial condition isn't just about having good reporting practices and not defaulting on debt payments. It's about fulfilling responsibilities and providing a good quality of life to residents.
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Houston’s fiscal problems are less critical than other major cities with large budget shortfalls—yet, their mayor is correct when he said his city is broke, that the financial approach of the city is clearly not working. Here’s why.
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New facilities aren’t bad, but they do present a problem when we can’t afford to maintain them after they’re built.
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When budget season comes around, it can be hard to feel good about policy wins when there are so many other important causes that are also fighting for funding.
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Let’s bust five myths on this highway expansion project.
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The proposed annual budget for Winnipeg, MB, reveals the true cost of the Suburban Experiment, and the vibrancy that the city (and so many others like it) has sacrificed in many of its neighborhoods.
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The U.S. Department of Transportation would have you think it cares about equity—but budgets are often more telling than rhetoric.
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Unless we start making better accounting choices today, we’ll be facing service cuts and tax increases every year going forward. …That is, until the day we can’t anymore.
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Making city budgets accessible to the average citizen is crucial for building stronger places. Here’s 4 examples of cities that made their budgets not only accessible, but even fun!
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You know what’s sexier than the latest mega-project on the far edges of town? Building a city that is resilient and prosperous, both now and into the future.
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It can be intimidating to try and wade through a 200-page government PDF filled with obscure acronyms and confusing charts. It doesn’t have to be. We’re lifting the veil on city budgets.
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Hundreds of small towns may simply shut their doors. There is a road to survival—and eventual prosperity—but it’s a narrow one. Who will take it?
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Fernando Peralta Berrios—president at the Las Familias de Rosemont neighborhood association in Fort Worth, Texas—discusses how he and his neighbors have partnered with the City of Fort Worth to guide public investment in its historically disinvested neighborhood.
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Strong Towns member Cindy Long discusses how the Strong Towns Community inspired her to ask her city council the hard questions about the city's financial status.
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The slide into municipal insolvency isn’t as fun as they made it sound. It’s time for cities to #DoTheMath.
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Easy money and uncontentious budget meetings sound nice in theory. But private and public sectors beware: lack of stressors can make decision-makers undisciplined and obscure huge bills that are sure to come due.
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My bedroom community’s streets are aging, and we recently learned that we need to double our pavement preservation spending to keep them from declining further. Here’s what we’re doing about it—and why the Strong Towns philosophy is instrumental for us.
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The unproductive use of infrastructure has put most cities, even those that are superficially prosperous, in a position where they won’t be able to afford to maintain what they’ve built. The signs of this crisis are everywhere—if you’re willing to look.
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If your city is struggling to balance its budget, it’s not enough to just cut costs and not seek to increase revenues. That’s like a cyclist who tries to improve their performance only by losing weight.
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