California Radical Transparency Financial Review

Report generated from our Research Data Warehouse. Created August 3, 2026. Most recent loaded FI$Cal data: FY25 period 11 (May 2026); California fiscal years begin July 1. This static report translates raw FI$Cal / Open FI$Cal accounting data into source-backed fiscal interpretation, curation status, and next forensic priorities.

How we deciphered FI$Cal →

Prepared by Herb Morgan’s California Radical Transparency Research Team. Scope: FY23. View this section in the interactive report
Full RangeFY23FY24FY25 YTD

Executive Summary FY23

Fact Rows692,748Aggregated budget and account records
Source Rows45,728,833FI$Cal source rows
Gross Spend$756.3BAbsolute FI$Cal movement before offsets and reversals
Net Spend$441.0BFI$Cal spending after offsets and reversals
Semantic Coverage55.8%FI$Cal labels with curated or official source-backed semantic coverage
Payee Identification58.3%FI$Cal payees identified and categorized

Evidence-Level Coverage

StatusShareAbs. dollarsCards
curated80.78% $4.20T283
official only18.17% $943.9B1069
generated0.93% $48.5B534
missing0.12% $6.1B536
Evidence-level progress: selected fiscal scope
Curated 80.8% Official only 18.2% Generated 0.9% Missing 0.12%

What this chart shows: Successive rounds of research connected FI$Cal’s unexplained labels to accounting definitions, crosswalks, and government sources listed in the appendix. Each round added context, moving more of the financial records from unexplained labels toward source-backed understanding.

Historical lines are adapted from the full-range enrichment history; current endpoints are measured for this fiscal scope.

Interpretive Bottom Line

The raw FI$Cal record shows where dollars were posted. The semantic layer explains what those postings mean, what they do not mean, and how much confidence the team has in that interpretation.

Selected scope: FY23 periods 1-12. Latest period in scope: FY23 period 12 (June 2024).

Promoted coverage: 98.95% of current reference-card absolute exposure is now either official-only or curated with official support. Remaining generated / missing ambiguity: $54.5B.

Across the currently loaded agency domains, the dominant public-accounting pattern is not ordinary agency operations. The large totals are mostly benefits, local assistance, apportionments, federal pass-throughs, grants, provider-financing mechanisms, transfers, and timing adjustments.


Evidence Level Definitions

Curated: Source-backed interpretation has been added beyond the raw FI$Cal label, usually combining official budget / accounting material with program, fund, transaction-pattern, or external source evidence.

Official only: The label is interpretable from official source material, but no additional semantic enrichment has been attached yet. This category can decrease as official-only dollars are promoted into curated cards with added context and caveats.

Generated: A plausible machine-generated or rule-generated label exists, but it still needs source-backed interpretation before it should be treated as decision-grade.

Missing: No semantic reference card is currently attached to that label. These are the cleanest candidates for direct gap-filling research.

Card: A reusable semantic reference unit for one budget label, code, program, fund, department, vendor class, or known gap. Cards carry interpretation guidance, evidence status, caveats, sources, and dollar exposure.

Presentation rule: This board-style web report prioritizes conclusion, evidence status, fiscal magnitude, and unresolved oversight questions. It is not an audited financial statement.

Explore the complete evidence

Choose a section to open its complete tables, accounting explanations, and source references.

Prototype search finds matching sections across all four periods. The existing warehouse research-lead search remains available in the current published report.

Focused research and proposed fixes