View of skyline from Capital City Trail along John Nolen Drive
Finance
David Schmiedicke, Finance Director

2025 Budget Outlook

City of Madison has faced a budget shortfall of some degree every year for the past 14 years due to state-imposed restrictions on City revenue and growing need for services. The City has been fortunate over the past 5 budget years to have sufficient funding from short-term federal pandemic relief and economic recovery funding, along with strong city reserves, to weather revenue losses and maintain service levels.  As we look to the future, the City is facing significant challenges to maintain service levels for a growing population in the face of the State Legislature’s limits on property taxes, state aid, and other revenue sources.

The Finance Department is actively engaging the Common Council and informing the public about budget challenges as we plan for 2025. This webpage will be updated regularly with information on the budget process, presentations, and other materials from public meetings.

About the City Budget

Sobre el presupuesto de la ciudad

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關于本市預算

A Sustainable Long-Term Plan for Madison’s Budget

At the July 16 Common Council meeting, Mayor Rhodes-Conway outlined two potential paths for the 2025 budget. The Mayor and Finance Director David Schmiedicke also answered questions from Alders about the city’s finances and provided details about pursuing a property tax referendum.

Frequently Asked Questions

Information Series on the 2025 Outlook

The Finance Department recorded a four-part series to explain the fundamentals of the City’s budget and options for closing the budget deficit. A fifth part to the series is an explanation of property assessments and property taxes, prepared by the City Assessor and Finance Department. One goal of the series is to provide a general understanding of the overall City budget as a first step, followed by an explanation of what has been termed the “structural deficit”.  This informational series is a first step toward deciding on an approach to balancing next year’s budget.

Part 1: Budget Foundations

Part 2: The Structural Budget Deficit

Part 3: Budget Balancing Strategies – Expenditures

Part 4: Budget Balancing Strategies – Revenues

Part 5: Property Assessments and Property Taxes

Budget Data

Below you will find datasets for the major phases of budget development. Datasets include General and Library fund amounts across agencies and by revenue or expenditure type. 

2025 Cost to Continue Budget Data

2025 Executive Budget Data

Public Meetings

Staff will be presenting information to the Common Council and Finance Committee throughout 2024. Public notices of the meeting schedule and agendas can be accessed on the City’s Meeting Schedule Website. Members of the public may register to speak during public comment, or may submit written comments to the Common Council or Finance Committee. Recordings to recent meetings will be linked below, and can be found on the Madison City Channel.

February 13: Common Council Presentation

March 5: Common Council Discussion

March 5: Presentation on City Finances from the Wisconsin Policy Forum

May 1, 16, 29, 30, June 5: Common Council Community Budget Conversations

Other Referenda

Other municipalities in Wisconsin also face these challenges. Since November 2022, there have been 65 municipal levy limit referenda, and more are under consideration.

Explore the interactive map below to see more. 

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