San Francisco Commodity Purchasing Data from Fiscal Year 2007

The San Francisco Controller's Office maintains a database of commodity-level purchasing activity from fiscal year 2007 onward. This data represents detailed purchase order information, with weekly updates, and includes reconciled totals between the city's purchasing and accounting systems. Payments to contractors and vendors are included, while sensitive payments such as employee reimbursements and human services payments have been removed.

Use Cases

• Analyze municipal spending trends based on commodity-level purchase order data
• Track vendor payment patterns based on supplier and non-supplier payee information
• Reconcile financial system discrepancies based on adjustments between purchasing and accounting totals

Strengths

• Data spans from fiscal year 2007 onward, providing a long-term historical view
• Updated on a weekly basis, offering relatively current information
• Includes reconciled totals between purchasing and accounting systems for accuracy

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment
• Sensitive payment categories have been removed, which may affect completeness for certain analyses

Provenance

Source

City of San Francisco Controller's Office

Collection Method

Maintained from the city's purchasing and accounting systems, with sensitive information removed.

Time Range

From fiscal year 2007 forward

Freshness

New data is added on a weekly basis.

Geography

City and County of San Francisco