Budget Builder Analysis - Conclusions





Overview	BB Use	Power	Participation	Design	Methods	Next Steps

Conclusions

Next Steps

The Budget Builder is a work in progress that is likely to continue for many years and in many forms. The Seattle Public Schools have committed to using the Budget Builder as their preferred method for submitting school budgets. At the time of this writing, plans are being drawn up for the third year's development cycle. In addition, the Cross City Campaign has talked about expanding the Budget Builder to other cities.

Licensing the Budget Builder to the Seattle Public Schools
The Seattle Schools want to continue modifying the Budget Builder in future years to more closely mimic their internal systems, as well as to add additional features that principals have requested, such as real-time budget monitoring and modification throughout the school year. Because Cross City *owns the Budget Builder*, the two organizations are negotiating a license for use and modification of future versions.

The licensing is important because it gives Cross City a chance to make some demands of the Seattle Schools with regard to community access. For example, Diana Lauber of Cross City initially asked that all budgets be made public once submitted via the Budget Builder. Geri Lim, the Chief Financial Officer of the Seattle Schools resisted that request, claiming that submitted budgets were "district planning documents," and that the district budget wasn't a public document until the entire district's combined budget was approved by the School Board. The timing of when documents become "public" is crucial to how much input communities can have over their school's budget.

Expanding the Budget Builder to Other Cities
Less clear are the plans for expanding the Budget Builder's reach. *Cross City works in several cities throughout North America*, and developed the Budget Builder as a pilot project that would be moved to other cities. For much of the development, Cross City staff were adamant about funding only work that was general and applicable to any city where the Budget Builder might be used. District specific modifications would have to be paid for by each district. Other cities have expressed interest in the system, particularly Los Angeles and Denver, but there are no specific plans at this time.

Moving the Budget Builder to a city like Los Angeles would present difficult obstacles. The Los Angeles school district is over ten times larger than Seattle's. (680,000 students vs. 47,000, $5.3 billion annual budget vs. $350 million). Scaling up the system would not be trivial. A good part of the reason why the Budget Builder was able to be *developed relatively quickly and inexpensively* is that the Seattle school district is moderately sized.

Moving to another city also presents a radical reconceptualizing of the web site. Currently the Budget Builder is one set of web pages on one single computer in one city. If Cross City decides to expand the project to other cities, what will the Budget Builder be and where will it be? How much of the site will Cross City maintain? Currently, the organization has no web site and no one in their main office with the technical skills to set one up or maintain it. What parts of the site will be specific to each city and who will develop and maintain them? If each district sets up and pays for its own site, what's to keep them from excluding community participation? These questions are only beginning to be addressed in conversations between Cross City staff, Andy, and me.

Another factor that Cross City must consider as it expands is what level of resources it has available to support community organizing in each city. To increase the level of citizen participation in future Budget Builder development, Cross City needs to step up its school-based budgeting awareness and training campaign. That has already been difficult, and may be even more so if it turns its attention to other cities before community awareness in Seattle has crystallized.

Future Technical Work
The Seattle Schools have contracted with me to work on the Budget Builder for another year. They had intended to hire someone as a district employee for this and other projects, but weren't able to find anyone satisfactory. My continued work on the project gives me an opportunity to make changes that have been needed since the Spring of 1998. Technical improvements to the Budget Builder will range from the mundane to the dramatic:

Many *graphic design enhancements* will occur, to further unify the look of the site and decrease confusion. "In process" pages will be finished or cleaned out. Navigation assistance will be clarified.
The *help system must be dramatically improved*, both because it is currently dismal, and because it is unlikely we will be able to provide training to all future users of the site. However, *training for known users*, such as budget office staff and principals, must be incorporated.
The Budget Builder and the Green Book (paper book of budget forms) must be synchronized to work identically, since users often use both together.
Performance of the budget building section must be dramatically increased, as users complained most vocally about the system being slow. Data entry must also be streamlined, as users experienced that aspect of the site as being cumbersome.
Processes must be designed to address problem areas that surfaced in past years, such as testing modifications to the site, and transferring data from SPS systems to the Budget Builder quickly and accurately.
The Seattle Schools technical staff should be encouraged to think about how their data might be used publicly, especially as they perform major upgrades to new computer systems. Instead of using ambiguous codes (ex. EQUIP/MOVE/OTHER SR-DR) that may only have meaning within the district administration, they could use intelligible English (ex. Equipment / Moving / Other Services) to describe budget items.

Future Community Participation
For the Budget Builder to remain a tool that is accessible to people outside of the Seattle School District, we must widen participation in the development of future versions. It is unlikely that a community voice will remain on the technical team beyond my work this year. The district is likely to keep the Budget Builder technically separate from its computer systems for one more year—and therefore somewhat accessible to direct change—but the district's technical staff is increasingly anxious about bringing the Budget Builder into its grasp. Once that technical transition occurs, the only way that citizens will notice changes is if they are aware that the Budget Builder exists and are invested in having it remain publicly accessible.

Some options for increased participation are:

Incorporating a Community Steering Committee along the lines of the *Principals Steering Committee*. This would empower a body of citizens to meet regularly and suggest features and modifications to the existing Budget Builder.
Community participation in usability tests. Tests for text readability and usability of the budget building section are necessary, and others will likely be too. Usability participants can be drawn from outside the district as well as users from inside the district.
Cross City sponsored training. Cross City has committed to a multi-year program of education about the importance of local control of school budgets and training in use of the Budget Builder. Part of the educational process can be opportunities for community members to comment on the Budget Builder.
Piggybacking off of existing school activism groups. Although we have called on local educational activists for our previous public meetings, more could be done. Cross City can arrange to demonstrate the Budget Builder at meetings of the local groups. We can work with those groups to solicit feedback on how the Budget Builder could be used to achieve their goals.

Adopting these strategies will increase the chances that the Budget Builder will improve as a valuable public resource.