Rye Brook, NY

Primary Objective

To communicate municipal finances to the community in a way that is both transparent and simple-to-understand.

Challenge

The Village of Rye Brook, NY is an active community that cares about how its tax dollars are spent.

“As with most villages these days, the residents in Rye Brook want transparency from their local government. They want to understand what’s happening, and as civil leaders, it is our responsibility to provide this information in a meaningful way so that we are on the same page in terms of providing services,” says Bradbury.

Rye Brook had been publishing flat budget data and audit reports on its website for several years, but that was not enough. They wanted to get ahead of the transparency curve.

Municipal finances, however, can be complex, so Rye Brook felt that this information was not as user-friendly as it could be for residents seeking this information.

We were impressed with the ClearGov Transparency solution from the start, especially the clean, simple interface. They are experts at presenting complex information in an easy-to-understand and visually-appealing way. And, as our partners, they have been responsive and professional. It has been a fun project to implement and the feedback from the community has been extremely positive.

Chris Bradbury
Village Administrator

ClearGov Solution

“After reviewing several financial transparency products, we found that ClearGov presented the Village’s demographic and financial information in the most straightforward way and at an affordable price. It had the best combination of graphs, text and comments which all provide the context to help us tell the story behind our numbers,” recounts Bradbury.

ClearGov delivers data on every municipality in the state of New York, which enables Rye Brook to put their numbers in perspective. “People were amazed by the amount of data available and how simple it was to understand with ClearGov’s infographic presentation,” says Bradbury.

ClearGov Transparency also gives Bradbury and his team the ability to benchmark any line item in their budget against a relevant set of peer communities.

We’re finding new ways to leverage the ClearGov platform every day.

Chris Bradbury
Village Administrator