Homewood picks OpenGov to replace legacy ERP system

The City of Homewood, Alabama has selected OpenGov to modernize finance, budgeting, procurement, and contract management after unanimous City Council approval in October. The move is meant to replace spreadsheet-based workflows, improve transparency, and give staff a single system for core financial operations.

Why it matters: - Homewood is replacing manual, spreadsheet-driven processes with a single system for finance, budgeting, procurement, and contracts. - The change is designed to reduce months of budget-cycle labor and give city leaders and residents better visibility into spending. - The city is also avoiding a legacy upgrade that would not have added modern capabilities like online payments.

What happened: - The City of Homewood, Alabama selected OpenGov to replace its legacy ERP system with OpenGov ERP. - Homewood will implement Financial Management, Budgeting & Performance, and Procurement & Contract Management. - The City Council approved the move unanimously in October. - Homewood is a suburb of Birmingham in Jefferson County and has more than 28,000 residents.

The details: - Homewood’s finance team had been relying on Word and Excel, with no centralized procurement or contract management system. - The city’s existing system was due for an expensive upgrade that still would not have provided modern functionality. - Each budget cycle required months of manual work. - Staff had no consistent system to run solicitations, track vendor evaluations, or store contracts in one place. - With OpenGov, Homewood will manage its general ledger, accounts payable, budgeting, and procurement in one system. - Workforce planning will be built into the budget cycle. - Centralized solicitations, supplier engagement, and a contract repository will give staff one place to manage purchasing. - Dashboards and public transparency tools will give council members and residents a clearer view of city spending. - Aspen Collins, Homewood’s finance director, previously implemented Budgeting & Performance in her role at Mobile County and championed OpenGov for the city. - Collins said OpenGov can pull real financial data in real time and expands reporting beyond budgeting.

Between the lines: - Homewood’s selection shows how smaller public agencies are using ERP upgrades to solve both back-office inefficiencies and public-facing transparency gaps. - The city’s decision also suggests a preference for faster modernization over a drawn-out upgrade to a legacy platform. - The choice follows a broader pattern among Alabama agencies adopting OpenGov ERP.

What’s next: - Homewood will roll out the OpenGov modules and move its finance and procurement work into the new system. - Once live, the city expects to build budgets in one place, align workforce planning with the budget cycle, and improve reporting for council and residents. - Homewood joins other Alabama public agencies using OpenGov ERP, including the City of Vestavia Hills and Eufaula Water Works & Sewer Board.

The bottom line: - Homewood is betting that one cloud-based system can replace manual work, improve reporting, and modernize how the city manages public money.