Budget Explorer · City of Tulsa

Where the money comes from, and where it goes

Comparable revenue, spending, and debt for City of Tulsa, 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 Jun 30, 2024. City of Tulsa's own FY2027 budget, in its own structure, follows below.

Audited actuals · Census classification · 412K residents

At a glance

Total revenue

$1.36B

$3,301 per resident

Total spending

$1.26B

$3,051 per resident

Spending per resident

$3,051

39th percentile of 71

Debt outstanding

$1.24B

$3,003 per resident · 35th percentile of 70

Own-source share

90%

89th percentile of 71

Capital share

29%

85th percentile of 71

Where the money comes from

$1.36B 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$75M5%
General sales tax$417M31%
Selective sales taxes$38M3%
License & other taxes$11M1%
Federal aid$85M6%
State & local aid$40M3%
Charges & fees$414M30%
Interest, fines, other$144M11%
Utility revenue$136M10%

Own-source share of general revenue 90% · federal aid 7% · property tax is 14% of taxes

Where it goes

$1.26B 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.

Transportation$268M21%
Public safety$267M21%
Environment & housing$211M17%
General government$137M11%
Utilities (water, power, gas)$125M10%
Health & hospitals$115M9%
Culture & recreation$66M5%
Interest on debt$34M3%
Public welfare$29M2%
Transfers to other governments$4.4M0%

Show top functions with operating vs. capital ▸

Function	Category	Operating	Capital	Total
Highways	Transportation	$36M	$148M	$184M
Sewerage	Environment & housing	$102M	$73M	$175M
Police protection	Public safety	$146M	$15M	$161M
Water utility	Utilities (water, power, gas)	$80M	$45M	$125M
Health	Health & hospitals	$102M	$14M	$115M
Fire protection	Public safety	$104M	$1.8M	$106M
Parks & recreation	Culture & recreation	$60M	$6.2M	$66M
General (unallocable)	General government	$32M	$21M	$54M
Air transportation	Transportation	$29M	$25M	$53M
Central staff services	General government	$31M	$6.4M	$37M
Solid waste management	Environment & housing	$32M	$3.9M	$36M
Transit	Transportation	$25M	$5.4M	$31M
Public welfare	Public welfare	$29M	$673K	$29M
Financial administration	General government	$29M	—	$29M

Trend · 3 fiscal years

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

Revenue

+18% over 2 yrs

$1.15B → $1.36B

Spending

+18% over 2 yrs

$1.06B → $1.26B

Debt outstanding

-5% over 2 yrs

$1.31B → $1.24B

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 Tulsa	Cohort median	Percentile	Higher means
Spending per resident	$3,051	$3,741	39th	more spent per resident
Revenue per resident	$3,301	$3,548	44th	more raised per resident
Taxes per resident	$1,313	$1,328	49th	heavier own-tax load
Debt per resident	$3,003	$3,865	35th	more borrowed per resident
Own-source share of revenue	90%	81%	89th	less dependent on aid
Federal aid share of revenue	7%	7%	51st	more exposed to federal cuts
Capital share of spending	29%	18%	85th	more building, less operating
Interest share of spending	3%	4%	26th	more spend servicing debt
Debt ÷ annual revenue	0.91×	1.05×	39th	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 402143212090 (Tulsa 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 · FY2027

City of Tulsa'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 31 departments.

$1.23B total

Water and Sewer$200M16%
Police$175M14%
Debt Service$170M14%
Transfers - Internal & Outside$156M13%
Public Works$118M10%
Fire$112M9%
Asset Management$49M4%
Human Resources$43M3%
Information Technology$38M3%
Finance$27M2%
Managed Entities - Culture and Recreation$24M2%
Park and Recreation$16M1%
All other (19)$98M8%

Parsed from the published budget book (pages 10-10) — all operating funds, before internal transfers and internal service funds are removed.
Figures are checked against the total the document itself prints before publishing.
Printed in thousands of dollars, so small departments are rounded.
This is the gross all-funds figure. Removing internal transfers and internal service funds gives Tulsa's net operating budget of $1,025,364,000; the capital budget of $202,768,000 is separate.
Source: FY2027 Adopted Budget, Executive Summary (Operating Budget by Programs and Departments) (published budget book), retrieved 2026-09-13. Open the source document.

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