ClearGov Advances Municipal Benchmarking by Incorporating Home Values

At ClearGov we believe that numbers by themselves rarely tell the full story. One must understand how each number relates not only to its respective historical figures, but also to its peers. With this in mind, we decided to build peer benchmarking into the DNA of ClearGov.

We were told countless times that municipal benchmarking is difficult. “There are so many factors to consider when comparing towns” was an oft heard comment. While we agree every town and city is unique, we also know from experience in Big Data that benchmarking is never 100% perfect – but it can get close with the right data.

With our latest release of ClearGov today, we are taking a big step forward in improving the intelligence that we provide to citizens and internal municipal stakeholders. After many discussions with local municipal leaders we’ve decided to incorporate Average Assessed Home Values into our benchmarking algorithm.

Traditionally our benchmarking model identified peer towns and cities by looking for municipalities with similar populations within a certain radius (measured in miles) of the town being analyzed. While this model captured many similar cities, it also captured cities that had vastly different tax bases. In other words, two towns could be close in proximity and population, but one town may be much wealthier. This difference in wealth results in a very different tax base and budget dynamic.

So we decided to use home value as a proxy for citizen wealth to better accommodate for different tax bases in our peer comparisons. The result is a vast improvement in ClearGov’s ability to dynamically identify peer municipalities and better benchmarking metrics.

The updated benchmarking algorithm is part of a larger site refresh launched today. The latest release includes new animated charting, per citizen metrics and an updated site structure.

The updated benchmarking algorithm has been incorporated into all Massachusetts cities and towns. New York and California will be updated soon.

About ClearGov Inc.

ClearGov helps the average citizen better understand their local government and how their tax dollars are being spent. Local government leaders also leverage ClearGov to better understand how their municipality compares to peers in an effort to make more informed budgeting decisions.