Laramie launches public finance tool for weekly city spending data

Laramie households now have a direct way to see how city money moves, with Open Finance giving the public a weekly-updated look at the city’s financial activity and no registration required to use it.

The City of Laramie says the tool is built for both broad questions and narrow ones. A resident can look at spending and revenues over time, then drill down to where money is going for street work, utilities, staffing, park projects, public safety resources and other day-to-day services that shape life in Albany County. That matters in a city where budget decisions often show up later in the form of road repairs, downtown projects, staffing levels and long-range planning.

The city introduced and demonstrated Laramie Open Finance at a council work session on Feb. 11, 2025. Administrative Services Director Jennifer Wade presented the tool, and Senior Accountant Spencer Keturi walked council members through how it worked. The city’s user guide says Open Finance pulls from the city’s financial software and updates automatically every week, making it a live public window into spending instead of a static report filed away after the fact.

City officials later said phase 2 of Open Finance would go live in mid to late fall 2025. That phase was set to add a Checkbook feature showing detailed information on checks, card purchases and other payments made by the city, information similar to what internal reviewers and the Finance Committee receive. For residents trying to follow a single contract, vendor payment or purchase pattern, that kind of detail turns a broad promise of transparency into something searchable.

Open Finance also sits inside a wider budget and accountability push. The city launched its second annual budget survey on Feb. 26, 2025, and kept it open through April 1, 2025. The City Manager’s Budget Advisory Committee, created in 2024 to advise on accountability and community involvement, had met twice by then and was already giving guidance on how to make financial information more accessible and relatable.

The City of Laramie Finance Division says it also provides monthly updates on expenditures and revenues to the City Council and management staff. Those internal reports now feed a public-facing system that includes the Community Financial Report, budget materials such as the Budget in Brief, and the online survey process tied to the budget cycle. The city says its FY 2025 Community Financial Report was its second Popular Annual Financial Report and was designed to give residents accessible information about financial position and results of operations. The city also earned a Certificate of Excellence from the Government Finance Officers Association for last year’s report.

The same transparency message carries into the city’s FY 2027 recommended budget, which is built around right-sizing government operations, investing strategically in capital development and building trust within the community. With Open Finance now in place, Laramie is making more of its spending data visible in real time, giving residents a clearer way to follow the numbers behind city priorities.