Funding Our Future: An Overview

From public safety, recreation and affordable housing to snow removal and parks maintenance, so many key aspects of what makes our community tick are funded by the city’s budget. Ever wonder where the money to pay for these services comes from? The answer is more complicated than it may seem and we are working to chart a more sustainable fiscal future based on our community’s values and expectations, as well as the current economic landscape.

Costs are rising right now in many areas, which means it is more expensive for the city to maintain our service levels. At the same time, we’re hearing a desire from some community members for the city to do more. It’s important for us to be transparent about available funds and some of the challenges we’re experiencing as we balance our services with community asks.

We know you expect us to be a responsible steward of your taxpayer dollars. We expect this from ourselves as well. That is why we are rethinking our financial strategy.

Boulder City Council has identified the creation of a long-term financial strategy as one of its top priorities, consistent with policy recommendations from the last two decades. Through this process, we hope to achieve more flexibility with the dollars we have and to identify potential new sources of revenue to better address dynamic needs and provide the level of service our community desires.

The pandemic taught us a lot about many facets of life we take for granted. Our local economy, and by extension, city programs and services were especially susceptible to the pandemic’s financial impacts. Most of the city’s budget comes from sales tax. With people spending less and businesses scaling back during the pandemic, the city received fewer dollars to pay for critical programs and services. Coming out of the pandemic, it’s more important than ever to focus our efforts on preparing for economic downturns in the future.

Rethinking our financial strategy also gives us the opportunity to weave our core city values of resilience, equity and sustainability into how we budget.

We’re committed to stretching our dollars as far as we can. We’ve started by carefully considering the ways we’re spending money now and making choices about what to stop doing and start doing to achieve the most important outcomes. We’re seeking increased flexibility to allow money to be spent where it is needed at any given time instead of having to be spent in a specific area. We’re also looking for ways to raise additional funding. Because we understand that our community’s capacity to pay more is very limited right now, we’re being thoughtful and strategic as we consider these possibilities.

The other work we’re doing is to ask you what you need most from us. Over the next year, we’ll be seeking your input on what you consider to be core, essential services and what acceptable performance looks like in these areas. By understanding which city programs and services have the most impact on your day-to-day lives, we can better forecast our costs and prepare together for our future.

The city’s budget comes from a variety of sources, including:

• Sales and use taxes, which are collected on items purchased and business done in Boulder. This is our largest source of revenue. 43 cents of every sales tax dollar goes directly to the city - 19 cents to the General Fund and 24 cents to dedicated funds for open space, transportation, parks and recreation, the Community, Culture, Resilience and Safety Tax, and the Arts, Culture and Heritage Fund. The other 47 cents of each sales tax dollar helps fund RTD, the state and the county, which are not part of the city organization.
• Property taxes, which come from property owners in Boulder. 13 cents of every property tax dollar goes directly to the city – 9 cents to the General Fund and 4 cents to public safety, parks and recreation and the Community Housing Assistance Program. The other 87 cents of each property tax dollar helps fund schools, libraries and the county, which are not part of the city organization.

We are committed to conducting engagement over the next year, with input opportunities beginning in the early summer. We look forward to working with you and your neighbors to develop a solution to best meet our long-term needs as a community.

This is the first in a series of blogposts about the city’s Long-Term Financial Strategy. You can learn more about the strategy and about upcoming engagement opportunities on the city’s website.