Educating Citizens About Government Finances
As communities across the country make more information available on-line, greater attention is being placed on making that information more understandable to the public. In particular government budgets are often reported in a format that is hard for most people to decipher and understand.
The Association of Government Accountants (AGA) several years ago started a Citizen-Centric Reporting Initiative to improve how financial information is communicated to the public. The AGA has created a template to assist communities with creating an informative and colorful 4 page financial report for distribution to citizens.
As reported in a recent governing article, over 100 states, cities, counties and federal agencies are creating reports as part of the Citizen-Centric reporting Initiative. Check out some of the completed reports created by government entities.
Perhaps this idea can be implemented in your community as a tool for informing citizens?
The definition of reinvent is:to replace with an entirely new version, to make over completely, to recast something familiar or old into a different form.In my opinion we need to reinvent government, business and ourselves. Today’s world is about constant change driven by the power of new ideas.For the past 17 years as an attorney, I have worked in government at the county, city, authority and school district level in the Buffalo, NY area. I have seen first hand the need for reinventing how government operates. For a period of four years, I served as Chief of Staff to the 9 member City of Buffalo Common Council. Government must engage the talents and skills of its citizens by becoming more collaborative and transparent in its decision-making and operations. Utilizing technology as a tool to engage citizens is something all governments need to explore.I have great respect for entrepreneurs as they put their passion into a vision, which results in new products, new services and new jobs. Entrepreneurs are on the front lines of change. As an adjunct college instructor, I see how students and everyone for that matter must continually change and reinvent themselves to survive and be successful in today’s crazy world economy.Some of my favorite change agent writers are Tom Peters, Seth Godin, Gary Hamel and Guy Kawasaki. I welcome the opportunity to meet new people, to further my own learning and to share ideas.On a personal note I am 47 years old, my other half Cheryl is an attorney in private practice and together we have three children, Michael age 20 and Joseph age 14 and our newest shock of an addition Julia, born 11/2/11. 
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