Introduction

A persistent financial crisis overshadows the administration of municipal government throughout the United States. The conventional solutions are not working. Traditional municipal decision-making does not account for what government is, what it should be doing, or what principles should guide it. And yet such an approach is being used to both evaluate the crisis and resolve it. Fixing municipal budgeting requires examining what drives it, how decisions are made, and what characteristics fundamental to local government organizations shape the process. The author’s solution begins a new discussion of the scope of government services. Government has a life-serving role—a role that is critical to understand and define. This book integrates the levels of economic and political discourse on the scope of local government, not just raises it. By combining knowledge of actual financial operations with a new, integrating framework, and an actionable budgeting solution—municipalities can take the first, long-overdue steps toward understanding, and resolving, their financial crisis.