Direct sources. Clear status. Practical public information.
Follow the Public Money — Louisville qualifying edition 4. Louisville Metro’s approved FY2027 Executive Budget Book reports $185,232,042.99 of approved capital-project authority and separately reports $70,374,373 of scheduled net FY2027 debt service. These are different records. Adding them together would not create a meaningful “spending” total.
Abstract, question, and scope
This edition asks: how should a resident distinguish the approved capital budget, its funding sources, and scheduled debt service? The bounded evidence is the approved FY2027 Executive Budget Book, pages 49–55 and 258–263, plus the embedded adopted capital ordinance. The review cutoff is November 2, 2026. Project-level contracts, invoices, payments, completion, maintenance cost, savings, and outcomes remain later evidence stages.
The approved capital authority
| Printed funding class | FY2027 approved authority | Share of approved total |
|---|---|---|
| Capital Fund | $7,107,475.05 | 3.8370% |
| Debt | $136,327,401.91 | 73.5982% |
| Other | $41,797,166.03 | 22.5648% |
| Total | $185,232,042.99 | 100% before display rounding |
The book’s legend breaks the Debt class into $100,459,401.91 of 10-year bonds, $19,468,000 of 15-year bonds, and $16,400,000 of notes. Those three values sum to the printed Debt total. Capital authority does not prove that every project was procured, contracted, invoiced, paid, completed, or converted into an outcome.
The scheduled debt-service record
| Period | Principal | Interest | External source shown | Net debt service |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| FY2027 | $47,550,399 | $34,412,635 | $11,588,661 | $70,374,373 |
| FY2027–FY2048 cumulative schedule | $834,770,399 | $289,773,630 | $130,947,288 | $993,596,742 |
Reproducible checks: $47,550,399 + $34,412,635 − $11,588,661 = $70,374,373. Across FY2027–FY2048, $834,770,399 + $289,773,630 − $130,947,288 = $993,596,741; the book prints $993,596,742, a $1 difference attributable to the displayed row totals/rounding. The discrepancy is preserved rather than silently “corrected.” Page 53 rounds the FY2027 budgeted amount to $70,374,400.
Why capital and debt service stay separate
- Capital authority authorizes defined projects and funding sources. Unexpended capital funds may span years.
- Debt issuance creates financing obligations with separate terms, dates, bidders, ratings, counsel, and repayment sources.
- Scheduled debt service is the planned principal/interest schedule net of stated external sources—not a project invoice or proof of an actual payment on the date a reader checks.
- Operating impact can include staffing, utilities, maintenance, licenses, or debt service. The budget book says those impacts are reviewed, but the project table alone does not prove a realized cost or saving.
A six-stage capital-to-outcome worksheet
- Authority: ordinance/project number, approved amount, fund source, administering department, and amendment.
- Financing: bond/note or other source, issue status, term, interest, external support, and restrictions.
- Procurement/contract: solicitation, method, vendor identity, contract maximum, scope, and amendments.
- Invoice/payment: invoice, check/distribution, payment date, refund/recovery, and balance—without double-counting components.
- Asset/project: design, construction, completion, acceptance, useful-life, and maintenance evidence.
- Outcome: stated goal, measured output/outcome, period, baseline, attribution limits, audit/finding, and correction trigger.
What the records establish, and what they do not
The approved book establishes a dated authorization and scheduled-debt-service baseline. It does not establish project completion, vendor selection, cash paid, savings, waste, market value, influence, favoritism, corruption, campaign coordination, or community outcome. No campaign-finance data are joined to this edition.
What Di Tran University can contribute
DTU can maintain a correction-ready capital-to-outcome worksheet and teach residents to ask the next evidence question without converting authorization into accusation. DTU does not speak for Metro, audit its books, determine legality, rank projects, or promise access, recovery, savings, funding, or outcomes.
Official source appendix
- Louisville Metro OMB — Approved Budgets by Fiscal Year
- 2026–2027 Approved Executive Budget Book
- Louisville Metro Council — FY26–27 Budget Information
Version 1.1, reviewed November 2, 2026. Correction: final arithmetic QA corrected the displayed Debt share from 73.5971% to 73.5982% and Other share from 22.5659% to 22.5648%; the source dollar values and total did not change. The current budget landing page was verified through official search extraction. Fresh command-line PDF retrieval returned HTTP 403; calculations use the previously hash-verified approved PDF (SHA-256 3612e8702450bbc780f67c325bd82b8948c85b698263f75864e20dcf14d4a6e4). No downloadable derivative is offered because a controlled public file route and print QA were not completed.
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