News

The Government Finance Officers Association of the United States and Canada (GFOA) announced the winners of its 2016 Awards for Excellence in Government Finance. GFOA’s most prestigious awards recognize contributions to the practice of government finance that exemplify outstanding financial management. The awards stress practical, documented work that offers leadership to the profession and promotes improved public finance.

Patrick J. McCoy, Director of Finance, Metropolitan Transportation Authority, New York, New York, was elected as president-elect of the Government Finance Officers Association of the United States and Canada (GFOA) on May 24, 2016. The election was held at the association’s annual business meeting in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Marc Gonzales, director, Department of Finance, Clackamas County, Oregon, became GFOA’s new president at the association’s annual business meeting in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, May 24, 2016. Gonzales accepted the gavel from 2015−2016 President Heather A. Johnston, city manager, City of Burnsville, Minnesota. Also at the business meeting, the association’s members elected a new GFOA president-elect and five new members-at-large, who will each serve a three-year term beginning immediately.

President-elect

At the Tuesday GFOA conference session, “A CFO’s First 100 Days,” Yousef Awwad, chief financial officer of Portland Public Schools, and Marion M. Gee, finance director at the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District, discussed strategies for getting a successful start in a new financial leadership role.

Most people starting out as as financial leader have came from the ranks of financial management. Hence, the new leader needs to recognize the difference between leadership and management. Here are some of the key ways to become a leader:

Have you considered how you can use data to look at your city in a different way – to find out what it’s really worth? In his Monday conference presentation, “The Financial Impacts of Land Use Policy,” Joe Minicozzi, principle of Urban3, a consulting firm created by a real estate developer, discussed the importance of data modeling to determine your real potential for increasing tax revenues. His advice is, in short, “Do the math!”

Central to understanding risk is a concept called the “flaw of averages”—the idea that a single average number obscures the variation in the data. In “A Financially Resilient Organization is a Risk-Aware Organization,” a session at today’s annual conference in Toronto, Process Omprovement Specialist with the City and County of Denver's Peak Performance Initiative Melissa Files and Executive Director of ProbabilityManagement.org Sam Savage discussed uncertainty in financial planning.

The general public has neither the time nor the technical expertise for using highly detailed financial information—they need guidance on how to extract information from your data. For example, terms that are commonplace for government finance officers are often completely foreign to most citizens. Therefore, the titles, labels, and other descriptors picked up from your financial system may need to be changed to more citizen-friendly terminology, according to "Helping Citizens Extract Information from Data," as session at GFOA's May 2016 annual conference in Toronto.

 Please click on the links below to RSVP for the following conference sessions. All other sessions do not require an RSVP.

Continued scrutiny of state and local government retirement plans is expected to last into 2016. GFOA will continue to educate members of Congress about the true fiscal condition of public pension systems, consider whether proposed initiatives provide the flexibility the public sector needs to provide retirement security to its employees, and oppose congressional proposals that undermine state and local governments’ authority to effectively govern and finance their pension plans.

Emily S. Brock has been appointed as the new director of GFOA’s Federal Liaison Center. She replaces Dustin McDonald, who left GFOA to pursue a government relations position in the marijuana industry.

The Government Finance Officers Association (GFOA) has announced the recipients of its 2016 scholarships. GFOA’s mission is to enhance and promote the professional management of governments and the awarding of scholarships is one of the ways the GFOA accomplishes its mission.

The Government Finance Officers Association’s (GFOA) 110th Annual Conference, Sharing Solutions and Strategies, will be held May 22─25, 2016, at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The keynote speakers will be Bruce Tulgan, who will speak during the opening general session, and Richard Florida, who will address delegates during the general session.