I. RECOMMENDATION:
Financial Services Director and City Manager recommend authorizing the City Manager to enter into a multi-year contract with ClearGov Inc. for budget and transparency software.
II. BACKGROUND:
Finance Staff viewed demonstrations of budgeting software companies such as ClearGov, Questica, and OpenGov. Staff determined that ClearGov best met the City’s operational needs.
The City currently performs the entire budget process in multiple Microsoft Excel spreadsheets as the budget develops through the multiple budget workshops the City has over the course of the several months commencing in February through budget adoption in June. There is a high chance for the corruption of information and formulas as staff copies the budget from one version to the next.
III. DISCUSSION:
ClearGov offers unlimited licenses and training allowed for multiple users at different levels per department. The ClearGov software is intuitive and user-friendly with some flexibility. The data input and changes have an audit trail. The software has a budget book bundle package and will have a personnel module available in Fall 2021.
The selection of ClearGov software allows Finance Staff to create a more efficient budget process. It provides an easy-to-use software that the City can continue to use as it grows but is not too sophisticated for where the City is now. Being able to conduct the entire budget process and create the budget book in one program will greatly help the Finance Department create an award-winning budget book.
The City will be purchasing the following modules from ClearGov:
- ClearGov Opearational Budgeting
- ClearGov Capital Budgeting
- Cleargov Digital Budget Book
- ClearGov Transparency
The Personnel module will be added at a later date once the demonstration is available in Fall 2021.
IV. ALTERNATIVES:
Not approve.
V. FISCAL IMPACT:
The annual subscription service fee will be $21,775, the one-time ClearGov Setup service fee will be $4,680 which will only be paid in the first year. The total first year cost will be $26,455 and subsequent years will be $21,775. The Fiscal Impact to the General Fund will be $2,645.50 at 10% allocation, all other funds are included on the ClearGov Invoice Allocation attachment. This would be an unbudgeted expense. |