Elizabeth Reich began her service as the City of Dallas’ Chief Financial Officer (CFO) in September 2016. In this role, Elizabeth is accountable for the financial policy and operations of the third largest city in Texas and ninth largest city in the nation, with an annual budget of approximately $3.8 billion.
The City of Dallas employs about 13,000 dedicated people whose primary mission is serving the more than 1.3 million residents of the city. As the CFO, Elizabeth is proud to work with a team of 560 employees. Together, we strive to find innovative ways to serve our City customers and address the needs of Dallas residents.
Elizabeth provides executive leadership for 1) budget and performance management, 2) procurement, 3) accounting, 4) treasury, 5) federal grant funds, 6) information technology, 7) equipment and fleet management, 8) risk management, and 9) internal controls and audit coordination.
In addition, Elizabeth was instrumental in brokering a compromise that saved the Dallas Police and Fire Pension, bringing biennial budgeting to Dallas, and negotiating a contract for private management of Fair Park. D CEO Magazine named Elizabeth in the 2019 Dallas 500 list and selected her for the 2018 Financial Executives award for outstanding public service. Elizabeth was recently named a Dallas Business Journal 2019 CFO of the Year Honoree, after having previously been honored as a CFO of the Year Emerging Leader in 2017. She serves on the board of the Dallas Chapter of Financial Executives International, is active in Women in Public Finance, and enthusiastically supports numerous mentoring programs.
The robust regional economy continues to boom beyond all expectations. Annual property tax values in Dallas have grown each year since 2012, including an all-time high of 10 percent growth in 2016, and strong 7.81 percent growth in 2019. Sales tax receipts also continue to grow and are projected to top $312 million in 2019, providing more than 20 percent of the City’s General Fund revenues. Since the Great Recession, the city of Dallas has consistently maintained an unemployment rate below the national average. In May 2018, the DFW metropolitan area generated the highest job growth rate in the country and beat New York, a metropolitan area with triple our population, by 5,800 jobs.
Dallas excels in its financial practices, earning the Distinguished Budget Presentation Award from the Government Finance Officers Association (GFOA) for every annual budget since fiscal year (FY) 1999. In addition, our Comprehensive Annual Finance Report has won the Certificate of Achievement for Excellence in Financial Reporting from GFOA since FY 2005. Dallas also purchases more than $875 million in products and services each year, a process overseen diligently by Procurement Services.
We continue to put service first in other ways, as well. The Office of Risk Management automated the process for liability claim checks, cutting the time it takes to issue checks to our customers from 16 days to just three. Equipment and Fleet Management completed a comprehensive fleet study and began implementing several recommendations, including better communication with customers and a heightened emphasis on fleet availability. Lastly, the Center for Digital Government recognized the excellent work done by our Information Technology Services department to improve transparency and enhance services through technology – Dallas placed 10th in the 2018 Digital Cities Survey for cities of 500,000 or more.
Prior to joining the City, Elizabeth enjoyed a 16-year career with the Social Security Administration, including serving as its CFO in 2015. In that role, Elizabeth was accountable for a program budget of more than $940 billion and an administrative budget of more than $11 billion. She was also responsible for providing executive leadership for acquisitions and grants, anti-fraud programs, financial policy and operations, facilities and supply management, media management, quality improvement and review, records management and audit liaison, and security and emergency preparedness.
Elizabeth was born in Oklahoma, is a citizen of the Chickasaw Nation, and Dallas is her home. She received her Master of Public Administration degree from The American University in Washington, D.C. in 2000.
For comprehensive financial information, please visit our Financial Transparency website.
Responsibilities