Austin Budget Simulator

[COAbudget]

Short description of the idea (140 character tweet):

Improve existing budget public engagement tool to more effectively and easily inform Austin residents/receive feedback on budget and service priorities.

What is your project concept or idea? What challenge or opportunity will it solve?

Every year the City of Austin’s Budget Office seeks resident feedback on budget priorities through an array of public engagement opportunities, from more traditional activities like public hearings on the budget, utility and tax rates to more innovative projects, like a budget board game (Budget in a Box). This year, the focus of our budget public engagement is the Austin Budget Simulator, an online tool that allows residents to give feedback on funding preferences in 11 different service areas.

We have received positive user feedback on the tool, but want to know how we can further improve future efforts. We are seeking a team to test our current tool and analyze ways we can improve our messaging, content, user experience, and brainstorm ways to increase awareness of budget engagement efforts in future.

Who will benefit from your project? Describe the humans at the center of the problem - who are they?

How would they benefit? Can you tell their story?

Do you have photos of them? Or quotes?

Austin residents! The budget document is the main policy document for the City and reflects the City’s values and goals. The Austin Budget Simulator is built around information from that document. With our public engagement efforts, we seek to breakdown the most salient points from the budget and present them to residents who then can personally experience the challenges City leaders face in deciding how to fund and otherwise prioritize services as they work through the exercise.

Issue area(s) relevant to your project idea:

• Open Government/Transparency

What is the current state of your project idea?

• I have a prototype, and I want to test it and improve upon it

Tell us more about the current state of your project idea.

Do you have any links to news articles, text, mockups, code, or data?

Austin Budget Simulator [online tool currently being used for budget public engagement]: https://austintx.budgetsimulator.com/
Budget Box 2.0 [the online component of the budget engagement tool used last year]: http://www.budgetboxapp.com/welcome
FY16 Approved Budget Document (Vol. 1 and 2): https://www.austintexas.gov/financeonline/finance/financial_docs.cfm?ws=1&pg=1

Tell us about yourself.

What is your background? Why is this challenge important to you?

Are you representing a group in submitting this project idea?

We work at the City of Austin Budget Office. Every year our office seeks resident feedback on and engagement with the City’s budget process, which culminates when the City Council approves the budget document in September. We think about how to communicate the wealth of information published in the Approved Budget and every year try to find fresh ways to involve residents in the process. We know the content of the Budget well, but we want to better understand how to effectively communicate this information to residents and receive their feedback.

[danielhonker]

Thanks for submitting your project proposal @COAbudget (so mysterious!). We are happy to inform you that your idea has been accepted to be pitched at the 2016 ATX Hack for Change!

Now that your project has been approved, here are some things we suggest you do next:
https://github.com/atxhack4change/2016-project-proposals#once-your-project-is-accepted-here-are-some-things-we-suggest-you-do-next

If you haven't sent us your contact information (name and email of your primary project champion) please do so now: [email protected]

You will receive an email shortly regarding you speaking slot for the Saturday morning pitches. Please let us know if you will no longer be able to champion your project at the hackathon.

[danielhonker]

@COAbudget you might want to connect with @jcdwyer1 on this Tax Receipt project. Looks like he'll be using budget data.

[danielhonker]

@COAbudget - you should have received an invite to join Slack. If you haven't already joined the team and seen the Slack channel for your project, it's #budget-sim. We'll be sending out an email with details on pitches soon.