One of the many pieces of the finance department is to dig into the numbers and make some sense of them. To aid in this effort, there has been a trend lately to streamline information, particularly financial-related items, into a one-page format, commonly referred to as a "dashboard." The goal is to condense and highlight the main pieces of information to allow readers to focus on key data and thereby increase the usefulness of the information. Anyone who may have attended the recent Town Council meetings and/or reviewed the agenda packets, have seen that we now present the monthly and year-to-date financial information via dashboard. A large part of managing the finances of the Town and preparing for the economic future health of the Town requires us to analyze our performance benchmarks in a variety of ways to ensure that we have fulfilled our commitment of fiscal responsibility to the residents of Harrisburg.

 

Two new tools are now at our disposal that anyone with a computer and interest in seeing the financial performance of Town and comparing that performance to other municipalities around the area and state can utilize. The first tool is sponsored by the Local Government Commission, the regulatory arm of the NC Department of Revenue, which closely monitors everything local governments do in North Carolina. This dashboard is called "North Carolina Financial Condition Analysis" and can be run for comparisons of the general fund, water and sewer fund and governmental activities. To access this dashboard, the web link is, www.nctreasurer.com/dsthome/StateAndLocalGov/lgcreport. These dashboards give a snapshot of the financial performance for fiscal years 2006 to 2010 for these funds with ratios such as available fund balance, debt service, and quick ratio, to name a few. Below is an example of the general fund dashboard in comparing some of our closest population peers that have both general funds and water and sewer funds. 

Another very useful and informative dashboard has been developed by the UNC Environmental Finance Center, referred to as the "NC Water and Wastewater Rates Dashboard." This tool can be accessed via the following web link,  www.efc.unc.edu/RatesDashboards/NCRatesDashboard_2011.swf. This dashboard has two main sections, rate comparisons and financial benchmarks.  The bill comparison section allows easy comparison of various indicators, such as bill comparison and cost recovery. The financial benchmark tab illustrates various ratios, such as operating, debt service coverage, and debt-to-equity. These indicators for Harrisburg can be compared to other utilities, based on groups, such as number of accounts, water source and distance. Below are examples of these reports, comparing those utilities within 50 miles.





As Harrisburg continues to grow and mature as a town, comparing ourselves to related peers and benchmarking our progress is essential. Now, these tools are available to every individual interested in this information and the creators of these dashboards have made them easy to generate and understand.