California State Controller's Office

California requires every city to report what it pays its employees. This dataset has that information for 2023 and 2024: the base salary, overtime, bonuses, and benefits (retirement and health insurance) for each position. So if you want to know what a firefighter makes in Los Angeles versus Fresno, or how much a city budgets for employee benefits, this is where that data lives. It comes straight from the State Controller's Office, though cities self-report the numbers rather than having them independently verified.

California holds billions in uncashed checks, forgotten bank accounts, insurance payouts, and other assets that people or businesses have abandoned. By law, banks and companies have to turn this money over to the state after a few years of no activity. This dataset lists all that unclaimed property worth $500 or more, including who it belonged to (based on their last known address) and which bank or company reported it. You can use it to see how much unclaimed money is sitting around in your city, or how much a particular bank or insurance company has turned over to the state. If you think some of this money is yours, you can search claimit.ca.gov to file a claim.

Want to know where a California city gets its money? Property taxes, sales taxes, utility fees, permits, grants from the state. This data shows the breakdown for every city, year by year, going back to 2002. It's like looking at a city's revenue receipt line by line. You can see how much each city pulled in from property tax versus charges for services, and how that's changed over two decades. The data comes directly from what cities report to the state, so it's granular but unaudited.

Every California city files a report each year showing how much money they spent and what they spent it on. This dataset has all those detailed line items, broken down by spending category like personnel, contractual services, and capital projects. You can use it to see exactly where a city's money goes, or compare spending patterns across cities. The data goes back to 2002 and updates annually.

Want to know where California counties actually get their money? Property taxes, fees, grants, enterprise fund revenue, licenses? This is the granular breakdown, filed by each county to the state. You can see exactly what revenue streams feed each county's budget, going back two decades. It's like getting the detailed receipt for all county income, not just the total.

Water districts, fire departments, mosquito control agencies, and other special-purpose local governments across California report their revenues every year to the state. This dataset shows all those revenue line items, broken down by source (property taxes, fees, grants, etc.) and type. If you want to know what a specific district collects in a given year, or compare how different districts fund themselves, this is where that data lives. It's raw and self-reported, not audited by the state, so use it with that caveat in mind.