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Back to Basics: How to be an Effective Listener

This Morning Buzz is brought to you by Lynn Kelly-Lehner from the City of Temecula. What I'm Reading: Applications for the Temecula Assist grant program Power Moves by Lauren McGoodwin Civil unrest. COVID-19. Re-opening the economy. Police brutality. Black Lives Matter. Defund the police. Racism. Violence. Protests. Resignations. Political crossfire. Fellow government friends, it is...

Podcast: Reopening and COVID-19 Testing with Sean Knierim, SidePorch

Sean Knierim Co-Founder SidePorch LinkedIn | Twitter Creating a culture of health. Sean Knierim, the Co-Founder of SidePorch, joined the podcast to talk about resources for communities in reopening after COVID-19 shutdowns and expanding testing capacity. He talked about the need to be adaptive and flexible in procurement as well as being ready to scale...

New! PAFR Fellowship Program

ELGL and the Government Finance Officers Association (GFOA) have to create the PAFR Fellowship Program to connect graduate students with local governments looking to create a Popular Annual Financial Report (PAFR) for submission to the GFOA award program. COVID-19 has made it difficult for graduate students to find meaningful summer professional work experiences (internships) -...

Influencing Change

Today’s Morning Buzz is brought to you by Jenn Reichelt, Manager with The Novak Consulting Group now a part of Raftelis – connect with her on LinkedIn and Twitter! We are living in unprecedented times. Over the past few months, we have been in quarantine and practicing social distancing, all while becoming adept at virtual meetings and ensuring...

I Have to Ask: Race, Equity, and Societal Divides

In this series, ELGL Co-Founder Kent Wyatt poses three questions to the guest columnist, and the guest columnist selects one to reflect on. This week, Justin Amos, Business Manager with Fleet Management, City of Charlotte, goes off script to write about events in recent weeks. I will be honest. I had a complete “Let me...

PAFR Fellowship Program

What's a PAFR? The Government Finance Officer Association's (GFOA) PAFR award program recognizes high quality popular annual financial reports that are designed to be readily accessible and easily understandable to the general public. PAFRs provide important information about a local government’s finances, policies, and goals. PAFRs are incredibly rich documents that combine financial analysis with...

Accelerating a Move to the Cloud: 5 Key Benefits

Today's Buzz is by Meredith Trimble, Sr. Content Specialist with Tyler Technologies, Inc., and former Acting Chair, Farmington, CT Town Council (Twitter, LinkedIn) Where I'm going: Touring Connecticut Farm Bureau farms and buying local ingredients What I'm watching: Community outdoor movies in creative new spaces like our town's polo grounds What I'm reading: Thanks to...

Opportunity Project Earth Sprints

ELGL members are invited to volunteer as user advocates for the Census Open Innovation labs' "Opportunity Project Earth Sprint: The Census Open Innovation lab is kicking off The Opportunity Project Earth Sprint. There will be two rounds of sprints in which federal agencies and technology companies work together to build products as solutions to problems from...

#CityHallSelfie Day, #ELGL20, FY21 Budget

On Friday, June 5, 2020, the ELGL Board of Directors meeting included some big decisions affecting all ELGL members. Here's an overview of the minutes with the information you need to know: #CityHallSelfie Day #CityHallSelfie day will be observed on August 14, 2020. (Annually, the big day is on August 15, but since that falls...

Rewind: Tools to Address Implicit Bias in Local Government

This webinar originally aired on June 4, 2020. Implicit bias can interfere with how we do our jobs and other situations. In this webinar, participants will gain an awareness around the concept of implicit biases, the role they play in our interactions with others, and tools to help us address and minimize them. This webinar...

Standing Out in Second Round Interview

This is a periodic series where members can anonymously ask our two anonymous experts (code names: Ellie & Jill…) about tricky #localgov topics. Want to ask them your own question? Email info@elgl.org. Hello Jill & Ellie, I'm looking for thoughts on how to really stand out in the second round interview for a promotional position. I've...

What a Southerner Learned about Housing Discrimination in the San Francisco Bay Area

This post is by ELGL member Andrew Hening, the Director of Homeless Planning & Research for the City of San Rafael, CA. Despite growing up in Richmond, Virginia, the former capital of the Confederacy, it took living in the San Francisco Bay Area to understand the deep-seated, systemic nature of racism in America’s housing system. Housing isn’t...

Podcast: The Experience of Black Social Media Managers with Christina Roach and Victor Henderson

Christina Roach Digital Content Officer City of Dallas, TX LinkedIn | Twitter Victor Henderson Communications Specialist North Central Texas Council of Governments LinkedIn | Twitter "Y’all, I’m hurt." Christina Roach, Digital Content Officer for the City of Dallas, Texas, and Victor Henderson, Communications Specialist for the North Central Texas Council of Governments, joined the podcast...

If You're Surprised, You're Not Paying Attention

This Morning Buzz was written by Katie Babits (LinkedIn, Twitter) and edited by Kylie Bayer (LinkedIn, Twitter). Our country is broken and it was designed this way. The systems that have created the current state of events are doing exactly what they were intended to do. Our systems were created by white people, for white...

Equity & Justice Articles & Resources

Share Your Resources: We're asking ELGL members to share their local government racial equity documents, policies, information pages, speeches and more. This may include press releases, information sheets, FAQs, best practices, community alerts, etc. Please use the form below to share your information and we'll upload it here for other agencies to replicate and share.

Open Ears, Open Hearts, Open Shoulders - ELGL's Response to this Time of Upheaval

*This post contains language and terms that might trigger or incite some readers. As an American, a black American, and a person who is often viewed as a second class citizen both personally and in professional environments, this past week has been tough. It was hard to watch the events that unfolded in Minnesota and...

Communication Tips from an EOC

Today’s Morning Buzz is brought to you by Danielle Rogers, Community Marketing Manager for the City of Newton – connect with her on LinkedIn and Twitter. What I’m Listening To: Pod Save the People from Crooked Media and Encyclopedia Womannica podcast from Wonder Media Network What I’m Reading: Untamed by Glennon Doyle (for the third...

UNC MPA Research: Innovation Cohort

A group of UNC MPA students recently conducted research on ELGL's Innovation Cohort program. They inquired about the best ways to remotely bring our innovation cohorts together when they are are hundreds (sometimes thousands) of miles apart. View the final report from UNC MPA Huge thanks to Savannah, Hannah, Kathryn, and Cecily for their work...

Recruitment and Succession Planning: Recommendations for ELGL's Board of Directors

ELGL member (and former webinar presenter) Mikayla Cutlip approached ELGL about researching our organization for her Arizona State University MPA program capstone and we excitedly welcomed her research on recruitment and succession planning for our Board of Directors. Here's the culmination of her research and work: Read her capstone report View her capstone slides Capstone...

#BlackLivesMatter

ELGL is canceling our Monday and Tuesday webinars this week to mourn with our communities and stand in solidarity in the fight against systemic injustices and racism. #BlackLivesMatter (Image from Black Lives Matter)