City of Wichita, USA - Budget Simulator

Overview

The City of Wichita in the USA were facing unprecedented budget shortfalls due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and needed to find a way to recoup a $4.7million overspend.

Before making any decisions on which services would face cuts it was important to find out where their citizens priorities lay so that the demand on the most necessary services could still be met.

In order to do so they opted to use a budget Simulator and offered participants the opportunity to have a say in determining which services would receive cuts and which would remain the same whilst working towards making savings to cover the shortfall.

Simulator helps educate the participant at the point of response therefore enabling the participant to learn about the difficult trade-offs that need to be made in order to balance the books and offers them a chance to deliberate over making these often complex and tough decisions; helping to replicate "a day in the life of the decision-maker".

What happens next

You can view the City of Wichita's Simulator by going to - https://wichita.budgetsimulator.com/

For more information on Simulator please head to - https://www.delib.net/simulator