2016 CAMA E-Brief Partner: |
President Marie-Hélène Lajoie, the CAMA Board of Directors
and National Office Staff
would like to wish you Happy Holidays
and a wonderful 2017!
CAMA Holds Quarterly Board Meeting in Gatineau, Québec
The Board of Directors of the Canadian Association of Municipal Administrators (CAMA) held their quarterly meeting in Gatineau, Québec on November 24th, 2016.
The Board dealt with a number of issues, but what follows are the highlights of those discussions:
Presentation by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities
Alana Lavoie, Manager of Policy and Research/Policy and Government Relations, FCM, joined the Board to provide an update on the Fall Economic Statement, Phase 2 of the Infrastructure Fund, Smart Cities, and the CETA Agreement. CAMA will continue to work with FCM in assisting them in these areas of work where possible. CAMA was also pleased to be invited to participate in a recent meeting in Ottawa with the Deputy Clerk of the Privy Council and several Deputy Ministers to discuss topics such as the federal infrastructure program, public transit, housing and green infrastructure.
Dinner for Federal Representatives
In the evening, the Board invited a number of senior Federal staff members to join them for a networking dinner to discuss a number of topics important to Canadian municipalities.
Update on Communications/Marketing Plan
Communications Chair, Louis Coutinho updated the Board on the Committee’s recent activities of the Communications/Marketing Plan. The Membership Campaign continues to make gains with the next phase of the project being to focus more attention on the direct reports including some LinkedIn advertisements. Please continue to encourage your colleagues and staff to become members: http://www.camacampaign.ca/
Also, watch for CAMA’s new website which is scheduled to be launched in January 2017!
Recruiting the Next Generation of Leaders
One of CAMA’s goals is to ensure that we are providing new and existing municipal administrators with information and a network that assists them in their role; encourages the next generation of leaders; and, promotes the importance of the Professional Municipal Administrator.
CAMA continues to work on two specific projects outlined below related to recruiting the next generation of leaders in municipal government.
- A Toolkit to Attract The Next Generation. CAMA and our Provincial/Territorial Association partners (LGMA (British Columbia), AMCTO (Ontario), OMAA (Ontario), LGAA (Alberta), ARMAA (Alberta), and AMANB (New Brunswick) are continuing to work on the preparation of a toolkit that can be used to attract new employees to the local government profession as a great place to start to build a career with the main audience being the “soon to be post secondary graduates”. We are excited to launch this new product mid-year 2017.
Also, don’t forget about the Insights West research (executive summary) that was conducted for this project. The full report can be found in the Member’s Section of the CAMA website. This report has some interesting insights which you may wish to pass along to your Human Resources Department’s when recruiting your own employees.
- CAMA’s Next Generation Project. Also, “Cultivating Leadership: A Guide for the Next Generation in Local Government” is a great resource to share with direct reports and managers throughout your organization. This document is designed in recognition of the importance of providing useful career advice to the next generation of local government leaders, and to provide an opportunity for our more experienced CAMA members to give back to the profession. It is our hope that it will help CAMA members at different stages of their career, students considering a career in local government, and potential future CAMA members.
Here are some short video clips of some of our mentors offering their advice:
Janice Baker: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbEQKJJba3Y
Gail Stephens: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bv5dNgwkIY0
Rhonda Stewart: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4qoacZl-Gc
2017 CAMA Conference and Beyond
Join us for the 46th Annual CAMA Conference in Gatineau, Québec, from Monday, May 29th to Wednesday, May 31st, 2017. The Golf Tournament and other Pre-Conference activities will begin on Monday morning with the Conference Program ending after the President’s Dinner on Wednesday evening.
Looking ahead, our 2018 Conference will be held at the Fredericton Convention Centre, and Québec City (the Hilton and Convention Centre) has been chosen as the location for the 2019 Conference. Discussions are just starting on the locations for 2020 and 2021.
CAO Performance Management and Evaluation Committee
This is just a reminder that the CAO Performance Evaluation toolkit can be found in the Member’s Section of the CAMA website for the first year. This will provide you with an opportunity to use the toolkit for your own annual review and provide any further feedback. Watch for a short survey in Spring 2017! We are also working hard on the formal communications plan to all CAOs and elected officials across the country for 2017 and 2018.
CAMA Code of Conduct Review Committee
The CAMA Code of Conduct Review Committee has now completed their work and will be launching a new Statement of Purpose for the organization in the new year. A special thanks to Jack Benzaquen, Chair of the Committee (and Board representative for Québec) and CAMA members Paul Stapleton (Honourary Member), Bernie Morton (CAO for the Town of Kindersley), Jake Rudolph (Deputy City Manager for the City of Abbotsford and CAMA Board Representative for BC and Yukon), and Gary Dyke (City Manager, City of Cambridge).
Member Services/National Office Update
Jennifer Goodine, Executive Director, updated the Board on various subjects. Of note were the following:
- As of November 14th, 2016, CAMA has 546 members with 113 new members joining the organizations since the membership campaign began in June 2015.
- The Executive Directors of the Provincial/Territorial Administrator Associations continue to meet quarterly to discuss areas of mutual interest across the country.
- CAMA is pleased to be partnering with Public Sector Digest for the Paper Writing Competition Please encourage your next generation of leaders to participate. The details can be found on the website: http://www.civicinfo.bc.ca/cama/news_item.asp?newsid=819
- Watch for the new schedule of webinars for 2017 for the ICMA Coaching Program.
- Long service award notices will be sent out in the new year.
- The on-line nomination forms and details for the 2017 CAMA Awards of Excellence Program will be made available in January 2017.
ICMA
Marc Landry, CAMA External Relations Chair and Third International Vice-President of ICMA, provided an update on the activities of ICMA including their new proposed Strategic Plan.
Affiliate Partnerships
Over the past year, CAMA was pleased to partner and participate in each of its affiliate organizations Conferences on the International Panel: Australia (Local Government Professionals), New Zealand (Society of Local Government Managers) and the United Kingdom (Society of Local Authority Chief Executives). This opportunity provided CAMA with the change to present a broad range of local government issues in Canada.
Marc Landry was also pleased to attend the LGANT Conference in Yellowknife in October 2016 and Jake Rudolph attended the AYC in Whitehorse this month. Presentations were made on the CAO Performance Evaluation toolkit and the value of CAMA membership.
Treasurer’s Report
Jeff Renaud, CAMA Treasurer, updated the Board on the Association’s finances. CAMA continues to be in a healthy financial position.
The next meeting of the Board will be held in Montreal from March 22-24, 2017.
Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas and a healthy and happy 2017!
Marie-Hélène Lajoie
CAMA President
Dear ICMA International Members, Affiliates, and Friends:
I am writing to request your help in broadening the international content of ICMA’s 103rd Annual Conference, which will take place October 22-25, 2017, in San Antonio/Bexar County, Texas. We invite you to participate in the Call for Ideas for sessions that fit into the tracks selected by the 2017 Conference Planning Committee.
To see descriptions of the tracks and instructions on how to submit your idea by the January 9, 2017 deadline, please visit the conference website: http://icma.org/en/icma/events/conference/welcome
In the early Spring, once the conference’s educational program is finalized, we will be reaching out to you again as part of a Call for Speakers. At that time, we will be looking for your suggestions of individuals from outside the United States who plan to attend the conference and would be interested and able to contribute to the content of the sessions.
Thank you very much for your help.
Best regards,
Ross Hoff
Conference Director
CHANGING SERVICES IN A CHANGING TOWN: THE CASE OF THE DALHOUSIE FIRE DEPARTMENT
Between the 1980s and the early 2000s, Dalhousie New Brunswick’s population slowly declined, caught up in the well-established trend of rural depopulation. With a declining industrial tax base and the highest per capita fire protection costs (almost double that of the next highest cost department), the community was forced to review its fire protection services. In the latest issue of the Public Sector Digest, Dalhousie’s former CAO and current member of the CAMA Board of Directors, Christy Arseneau recounts how her team successfully moved the community from a combined career/paid-on-call fire department to solely an on-call department.
Read “CHANGING SERVICES IN A CHANGING TOWN: THE CASE OF THE DALHOUSIE FIRE DEPARTMENT” here: https://publicsectordigest.com/article/changing-services-in-changing-town-case-dalhousie-fire-department
2017 PUBLIC SECTOR DIGEST-CAMA PAPER WRITING COMPETITION IN MUNICIPAL MANAGEMENT
The rate of retirement among senior staff in the municipal sector, combined with the fierce competition for talent across sectors, has made it imperative to nurture interest in careers in municipal government among up and coming generations of Canadians. The PSD-CAMA Paper Writing Competition in Municipal Management will provide graduate students across the country with the opportunity to explore complex issues in municipal administration.
The Public Sector Digest (PSD) and the Canadian Association of Municipal Administrators (CAMA) have partnered to launch this paper writing competition in order to introduce Canada’s future leaders to the dynamic world of municipal governance. Our hope is that new solutions to entrenched municipal challenges may emerge from this competition, with a new generation of talented Canadians exploring issues in municipal administration. The winning paper will be published in the “The Next Generation of Leadership” issue of the Public Sector Digest, going to print in March 2017. The author of the winning paper will also be invited to present at CAMA’s annual conference, taking place in May 2017 in Gatineau, QC.
(1) ELIGIBILITY: Authors must be enrolled in a Canadian university graduate-level program in at least one academic term during the 2016-17 academic year, on either a full or part-time basis.
(2) RULES & PROCESS
- The paper must be submitted in word format for revision purposes
- The paper must be sole-authored (not group authored)
- The paper cannot have been previously published elsewhere, or be under consideration for publication currently
- The paper must be between 1500 and 2000 words in length
- Submission deadline: January 20th, 2017 5pm ET
- Submit papers to [email protected] indicating in the subject line “PSD-CAMA Paper Writing Competition Submission”
- Submit with your paper, a short (2-3 line bio), the name of your academic program and post-secondary institution, and your contact information (phone number)
(3) TOPIC: Authors must identify a challenge facing municipal administrators in Canada today, propose a solution or number of solutions to address that challenge, and explore the benefits/draw-backs associated with implementing the proposed solution. For example, the author might discuss inefficiencies in the processes or structure of municipal government, presenting Lean training as a potential solution for municipal administrators to consider. If possible, all submissions should incorporate real-world examples of the solution in practice. The focus of the paper should be on the impact that the identified municipal challenge (and proposed solution) has on city managers/chief administrative officers (CAOs) specifically, rather than in relation to mayors or political representatives in local government.
(4) ASSESSMENT: Submissions will be assessed against the following criteria:
- Originality (25%) - Does the author present an original approach to the challenge and/or solution in question?
- Research (25%) - Has the author conducted sufficient research in support of the completion of his or her submission?
- Clarity (25%) - Does the author present a clear challenge, a compelling solution to the challenge, and a thorough analysis of the solution?
- Significance/relevance (25%) - Is the submission timely and relevant to municipal administrators in Canada today?
(5) SELECTION & RECOGNITION : Following the deadline for submissions, papers will be reviewed by a committee of judges made up of PSD's editorial board and selected members of CAMA's board. Papers will be judged against the above assessment criteria. After the committee has read and scored each paper, the committee will discuss the top papers and determine the winner of the inaugural competition. PSD will publish the winning paper in the March 2017 print issue of the Public Sector Digest and provide the author with a 1 year complimentary membership to the publication. CAMA will provide the author with a complimentary registration for its 2017 conference in Gatineau and provide the author with the opportunity to present his or her paper to the conference delegation, made up of city managers from across Canada.
CONTACT US:
[email protected]
519.690.2565
www.publicsectordigest.com
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