How does the City of Stillwater determine how your tax dollars are used? Much like the budget you use at home. For instance, you plan for known expenses; however, if your roof begins to leak or a pipe in your kitchen bursts, you will have to use money set aside for the unexpected or you have to adjust your spending to pay for the repairs?.
The City also has to plan for the known expenses and to save for future and unexpected expenses. For example, the City must ensure proper funding in its Annual Budget so that:
departments have the funds they need to operate,
employees are compensated fairly for the work they do,
future capital projects are funded, and
reserve funds are adequate in case of emergency.
Budget Overview
Why does the City prepare a budget?
A budget serves many purposes, which are listed as follows:
Provides a flexible working plan for operating the City in the coming year.
Converts the City’s long- and short-term plans and policies into services and programs.
Establishes the amount of revenue expected to be available, which sets limitations on the amount of expenditures that can be supported.
Establishes the costs of providing services and programs.
Sets priorities to determine how the resources will be allocated among the services and programs our citizens expect and need.
Provides a benchmark to which actual revenues and expenses can be compared.
To comply with the Oklahoma Municipal Budget Act, 11 O.S. 17-201.
You are a part of this year-round process. Public hearing(s) are held in March-May concerning the proposed budget for the next year. Contact the City Manager’s Office or visit the website for the specific times of these meetings.
The City has adopted the zero-based budgeting philosophy of budget preparation. Department heads are charged with developing annual action plans to achieve departmental strategies. Budgets are built around the tactics used to complete the departmental strategies. Each department’s budget submission is measured for reasonableness against a rolling three-year average of actual expenditures. Large increases must be justified and related back to tactics used to achieve departmental strategies. Tactics change over time and so do budgets.
For more information on zero-based budgeting, visit the hyperlinks below:
To do this, the City uses a four-step process (administrative budget preparation, City Council approval, implementation, and feedback in the form of year-end accounting and financial reporting) that takes into account the best interest of all stakeholders – citizens, elected officials and city staff—and is guided by the Stillwater Strategic Plan.
The Stillwater City Council has established a set of strategic priorities and goals that influence how resources are allocated in the budget. The information outlined in the Stillwater Strategic Plan helps the city officials manage daily operations while remaining focused on challenges and opportunities for the future.
The Strategic Plan's six strategic priorities are as follows:
