New York City Comptroller John C. Liu today launched “My Money NYC”, a website that will be updated daily to give New Yorkers unparalleled access to the City’s finances, encourage community-government collaboration on fiscal matters and provide user-friendly performance measures.

“Everyday New Yorkers want to see — and track — how their tax dollars are spent,” Comptroller Liu said. “My Money NYC will be a powerful tool for New Yorkers to shine sunlight through perceptions of smoke-filled rooms and backroom deals. Sunlight will inherently create proper incentives to save money for the City, which is more important than ever before, and goes a long way to restore accountability and public confidence in City government.”

Comptroller Liu credited Simcha Felder, Deputy Comptroller for Accounting & Budget; Tina Kim, Deputy Comptroller for Audit; and Mike Bott, Assistant Comptroller for Information Technology and Chief Information Officer for their work on My Money NYC.

The new website (www.comptroller.nyc.gov/mymoneynyc) uses cutting-edge technology to provide transparency, measure the performance of agency initiatives and encourage partnerships between communities and government.

My Money NYC initiatives include:
• NYC Checkbook: An unprecedented effort that will allow users to search a database and download City expenditures made by check or Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) which, in the FY2010 estimated budget, totaled nearly $60 billion dollars.  Users will be able to search for expenditures in a number of different ways including by vendor or payee name, agency, check amount and check/EFT number.
• Open Audit:  An interactive webpage where New Yorkers can submit ideas for audits to save the City money, increase revenue and improve the efficiency of agencies.
• ClearView: An initiative started by former Comptroller William C. Thompson, Jr. which allows users to search for City contracts registered with the Comptroller’s Office. 
• MWBE Report Card: Measures the performance of City agencies in achieving their MWBE goals, especially in light of Local Law 129 of 2005, which set out hard targets, agency-by-agency, of government contracting opportunities for minority- and women-owned business enterprises.

Open Audit and ClearView are currently available.  NYC Checkbook will launch on July 1st, the start of FY2011.  The MWBE Report Card will be unveiled at the end of the current calendar year.

(YWN Desk – NYC)