Policymakers’ Perceptions of the Benefits of Citizen-Budgeting Activities

ABSTRACT:

Citizen budgeting has become an increasingly common practice in municipalities across the United States. It offers an alternative to traditionally technocratic budgeting processes, and can connect and engage citizens in decisions about services and funding. Little research has been conducted on how local policymakers perceive citizen budgeting and outcomes. This study examined the benefits local policymakers identified following two successive years of a citizen-budgeting process in a mid-sized Midwestern city. Interviews with 23 local policymakers (a mayor, city council members, and city department heads) identified nine types of benefits produced by the citizen-budgeting process. The study demonstrates that identifying perceived benefits of citizen-budgeting processes can shed light on the question of the extent to which such budgeting methods are citizen-driven, leader-driven, or a combination of both.

KEYWORDS::

• citizen budgeting
• local government
• public input
• public participation

Acknowledgments

We would like to acknowledge and thank the Office of the Mayor and the City Council members of Lincoln, Nebraska, for their involvement and support of these public-input processes, as well as the city department heads and, most importantly, the members of the public who engaged in these efforts. We would also like to thank the Lincoln Community Foundation and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation for their support of these activities. The views presented in this article are those of the authors themselves.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Tarik Abdel-Monem

Tarik Abdel-Monem is a Research Specialist at the Public Policy Center at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska. Mitchel N. Herian is a Faculty Fellow at the Public Policy Center at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska. Rick Hoppe is Chief of Staff for the Mayor of Lincoln, Nebraska. Lisa M. PytlikZillig is a Research Associate Professor at the Public Policy Center at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska. Alan J. Tomkins is the Director of the Public Policy Center at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska.