On the Front Lines, Meeting with Government Leaders

Recently, our team has been at two important gatherings of local government officials. In Baltimore, Maryland, we joined the International City/County Management Association’s (ICMA) Annual Conference. Each year, the event brings together local governments and govtech experts to share innovative ideas and practical strategies that can help cities and citizens throughout the world thrive. And in Kingston, Ontario, we joined the annual meeting of the Ontario Building Officials Association. OBOA represents building officials from across the province and inspires the building of safe, sustainable and accessible communities.

At both events we had the opportunity to share the work CSDC is doing to better connect local governments to the citizens they serve. And we demonstrated how our Amanda software can help governments attract and manage growth.

At ICMA, there were a number of key speakers and meetings that struck us — including several on how communities can use technology to improve operations and better meet needs and challenges. One session, “Smart Communities: What Are They,” explored how cities introduce innovations across their organizations in order to improve their efficiency in delivering local government services. The panel was led by Jane Christenson who serves as deputy city administrator of the City of Redmond, Washington. Throughout the event our team had a number of conversations about smart cities with attendees.

At OBOA we met with building officials from across the province to talk about their latest needs in managing high building standards especially while their communities grow. We were able to demonstrate how the several modules and apps of Amanda’s Permitting, Licensing and Compliance software can help manage and speed the process of permitting, inspections and more.

Karen Pinkos (Assistant City Manager for El Cerrito, California), newly-elected president of ICMA, offered remarks at the ICMA event about bringing government representatives together to share ideas. We think she captured why events like ICMA’s and OBOA’s are so important: “not only are we teaching, but we’re learning.”

We’re looking forward to both events next year! If you weren’t at one of those events and would like to talk about how Amanda can help you manage operations and serve citizens more effectively, get in touch!