RubinBrown Public Sector Stats 2017

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

RubinBrown is a leader in providing accounting and auditing services to state and local governments with offices in Denver, Kansas City, Las Vegas, Nashville and St. Louis. As a service to the local governments in the communities we serve, we have developed the Public Sector Stats. The study includes results for municipalities in the St. Louis, Kansas City, Denver Front Range metropolitan areas as well as cities throughout the state of Tennessee. The RubinBrown Public Sector Services Group has an extensive and is a leader in providing accounting and auditing services to governments. All cities included in the data have populations greater than 5,000. Additionally, the cities of St. Louis, Kansas City, Nashville, Memphis and Denver are excluded from the study due to their size relative to the other municipalities. Finally, for purposes of this study, metropolitan St. Louis includes municipalities in both Missouri and Illinois, metropolitan Kansas City includes municipalities in both Kansas and Missouri, Denver consists of municipalities primarily in the Front Range region and Tennessee municipalities are throughout the state with the majority of them in middle - Tennessee. Methodology Financial information was collected from the 2016 fiscal or calendar year Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR), or from the 2016 audited financial statements if no CAFR was prepared. All municipalities included in the study prepare financial statements in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. Key financial ratios were calculated in three categories: government-wide (governmental activities only), governmental funds and general fund information. Each participant in the survey received customized financial statistics to benchmark against other cities and use as an analysis tool. This year, a total of 41 St. Louis municipalities, 24 Kansas City municipalities, 32 Denver Front Range municipalities and 33 Tennessee municipalities participated. Format of the Report The ratios are presented separately for the St. Louis, Kansas City, Denver and Tennessee regions. The average population of the cities included in the St. Louis region was 22,000. This compares to the average population of 47,000 for cities surveyed in the Kansas City region, 82,000 for those in the Denver region and 52,000 in Tennessee. For each ratio presented, the report presents information by quartile with a focus on the median over a longer term to provide some trend analysis. In previous years the focus was on the average. It was determined that although the results are different, the median is a better representation of the center of the results of the ratios for each region and eliminates the distortion caused by any outliers. The computed values for each ratio were also sorted from more favorable to less favorable and quartiles were determined. The quartile information is presented by displaying the ratio value that separates each quartile. For a description and interpretation of the ratios, please refer to the “Financial Ratio Interpretations” section on page 14.

Executive Summary

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