Budget Explorer · City of Fort Worth

Where the money comes from, and where it goes

Comparable revenue, spending, and debt for City of Fort Worth, on the same Census classification used for every city, county, and state in the Library — so the figures line up with peers rather than with the government's own budget book. Latest year: FY ending Sep 30, 2023. City of Fort Worth's own FY2026 budget, in its own structure, follows below.

Audited actuals · Census classification · 957K residents

At a glance

Total revenue

$2.31B

$2,415 per resident

Total spending

$2.49B

$2,602 per resident

Spending per resident

$2,602

27th percentile of 71

Debt outstanding

$2.85B

$2,975 per resident · 31st percentile of 70

Own-source share

92%

96th percentile of 71

Capital share

25%

74th percentile of 71

Where the money comes from

$2.31B total

Own-source revenue (taxes, charges, interest) versus aid from other governments. Utility and trust revenue are shown alongside general revenue but run on their own books.

Property tax$668M29%
General sales tax$345M15%
Selective sales taxes$106M5%
License & other taxes$22M1%
Federal aid$89M4%
State & local aid$64M3%
Charges & fees$437M19%
Interest, fines, other$239M10%
Utility revenue$341M15%

Own-source share of general revenue 92% · federal aid 5% · property tax is 59% of taxes

Where it goes

$2.49B total

Current operations plus capital outlay, grouped by Census function. Interest on debt and transfers to other governments are broken out so they are not hidden inside services.

Public safety$683M27%
Environment & housing$587M24%
Utilities (water, power, gas)$484M19%
General government$249M10%
Transportation$195M8%
Culture & recreation$120M5%
Interest on debt$91M4%
Health & hospitals$80M3%

Show top functions with operating vs. capital ▸

Function	Category	Operating	Capital	Total
Water utility	Utilities (water, power, gas)	$182M	$302M	$484M
Police protection	Public safety	$441M	$14M	$455M
Sewerage	Environment & housing	$172M	$190M	$363M
Fire protection	Public safety	$201M	—	$201M
Housing & community development	Environment & housing	$154M	$126K	$155M
Highways	Transportation	$76M	$76M	$152M
General (unallocable)	General government	$116M	$23M	$139M
Parks & recreation	Culture & recreation	$86M	$8.7M	$95M
Health	Health & hospitals	$78M	$1.9M	$80M
Solid waste management	Environment & housing	$68M	$1.1M	$69M
Central staff services	General government	$53M	—	$53M
Air transportation	Transportation	$30M	$7.3M	$37M
Protective inspection & regulation	Public safety	$27M	—	$27M
Libraries	Culture & recreation	$26M	—	$26M

Trend · 3 fiscal years

Nominal dollars. The Census Bureau cautions that single-government series are edited only for aggregates — read direction, not decimals.

Revenue

+19% over 2 yrs

$1.94B → $2.31B

Spending

+22% over 2 yrs

$2.04B → $2.49B

Debt outstanding

+11% over 2 yrs

$2.56B → $2.85B

How it compares · 71 cities and counties in the Library

Percentile within the cohort on each place's latest Census year. Higher is not better — the last column says what a high reading means so you can decide whether it matters here.

Measure	City of Fort Worth	Cohort median	Percentile	Higher means
Spending per resident	$2,602	$3,741	27th	more spent per resident
Revenue per resident	$2,415	$3,548	16th	more raised per resident
Taxes per resident	$1,191	$1,328	42nd	heavier own-tax load
Debt per resident	$2,975	$3,865	31st	more borrowed per resident
Own-source share of revenue	92%	81%	96th	less dependent on aid
Federal aid share of revenue	5%	7%	33rd	more exposed to federal cuts
Capital share of spending	25%	18%	74th	more building, less operating
Interest share of spending	4%	4%	53rd	more spend servicing debt
Debt ÷ annual revenue	1.23×	1.05×	65th	more leveraged

About this data

Census classification categories, not this government's own budget structure. Figures are audited actuals for the fiscal year shown, not the adopted budget.
The Census Bureau edits unit-level data only to produce state and national aggregates and advises against reading it as a precise time series for any single government; treat year-over-year moves under ~5% as noise.
Employee-retirement-system revenue is excluded (published separately by Census). Utility and insurance-trust revenue are shown separately from general revenue.
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Annual Survey of State and Local Government Finances (Individual Unit public-use files), unit 482439176375 (Fort Worth City). Retrieved 2026-09-07. Classification manual.

Spot an error, or know a better source for this place's adopted budget? Suggest an edit on the assessment.

Adopted budget · FY2026

City of Fort Worth's own budget, in its own structure, read from its published budget book and checked against the total the document itself prints. This is the current year — more recent than the Census series above, but only comparable to this city's own history. Totals cover 22 departments.

$1.11B total

Police$330M30%
Fire$227M21%
Transportation and Public Works$112M10%
Non-Departmental$84M8%
Park and Recreation$81M7%
Property Management$36M3%
Library$31M3%
Development Services$30M3%
Code Compliance$29M3%
Emergency Management and Communications$21M2%
City Manager's Office$18M2%
Municipal Court$17M2%
All other (10)$89M8%

Parsed from the appropriation ordinance itself (Section 1, General Fund) — the department figures sum exactly to the ordinance's printed General Fund total.
General Fund only. The ordinance appropriates each other fund in its own section, and the city's budget book puts all funds at about $3.1 billion.
Fort Worth's site refuses non-browser clients, so this ordinance is refreshed by hand rather than by the scheduled job.
The city publishes no citywide table of departments across all funds — only one page per department.
Source: FY2026 Budget Ordinance 27979-09-2025 (Section 1, General Fund) (published budget book), retrieved 2026-09-08. Open the source document.

Looking for how this fits City of Fort Worth's capacity to deliver? The fiscal dimension, binding constraint, and pathways live in the City of Fort Worth capacity assessment.