ICMA - International City/County Management Association
12/16/2024 | News release | Distributed by Public on 12/16/2024 13:53
ICMA Belgium Global Exchange Series - Exello.net Conference: Our World Is Changing Faster than We Are
In May of 2024, a group of ICMA members, many from ICMA's Global Engagement Committee, joined members of the ICMA Executive Board, ICMA staff, and other local government professionals, to travel to Belgium for an immersive global exchange in the cities of Bruges and Hasselt. The entire exchange covered an array of topics such as mobility, water management, cultural preservation, veteran reintegration, AI in local government, and more. The hands-on and diverse experiences provided by the exchange gave participants a whole new perspective on these topics and how they can be integrated into their own communities.
The following piece covers the ICMA delegation's attendance and participation at ICMA strategic ally in Belgium, Exello.net's annual conference covering AI, local governance administrative reform, citizen engagement, leadership, urban transformation and more.
After the very information-rich and impactful visit to Bruges, Belgium, the approximately 50-member delegation from ICMA traveled to Hasselt, Belgium, to attend the conference of ICMA's strategic ally in Belgium, Exello.net. The conference, appropriately named "Our World Is Changing Faster than We Are," dove into topics such as AI, local governance administrative reform, citizen engagement, leadership, urban transformation, and more. Luc Jolie, president of Exello.net, shared the impact that the presence of this delegation had on the event. "Never before had such a large and strong delegation from ICMA been present at one of our events in Europe. It was a great honor for our professional association, at the very least demonstrating that ICMA highly values its partnership with our organization." Jolie went on to share the Exello.net team's thoughtful integration and accommodation of the ICMA delegation, and how "it resulted in an interesting mutual exchange of best practices, stories, insights, and so on. It expanded our network and made the world feel a bit smaller for each participant, while at the same time giving the sense of being part of a much bigger story."
Not only did the ICMA delegation get to learn from Belgian local government professionals at the Exello.net conference, but they also had a chance to share their own knowledge and best practices. One particularly impactful example of this was during the Changing Landscape for Citizen Engagement in Local Government session, featuring former Belgian city manager Joelle Eggermont, who joined ICMA Executive Board members Lon Pluckhahn, Tanya Ange, and Jeff Towery for a panel discussion about the need to create and maintain equitable citizen engagement opportunities and best practices for establishing opportunities in communities.
Changing Landscape for Citizen Engagement in Local Government session, featuring a former Belgian city manager and ICMA Executive Board members.This panel highlighted one of the most important steps toward successful community engagement: meeting residents where they are. Examples of this can be found by conducting meetings at farmer's markets, during community gatherings, or in different neighborhood locations. Panelists indicated that these efforts were successful because they enabled a greater and more diverse number of residents to participate in these engagement efforts. While meeting residents where they are is a strong first step toward successful community engagement, the next is ensuring that policies and procedures reflect equitable engagement. For example, providing stipends or childcare during engagement sessions opens up opportunities for a new sector of the community that may not have been able to previously participate.
To create an effective community engagement policy, the panelists noted the importance of understanding the purpose of engagement, knowing what you're going to do, where you're going to do it, and how to implement feedback loops. One suggestion from the panel to ensure continuous feedback was to name the same contact persons on the community staff to serve as liaisons to different demographics or neighborhoods in order to foster consistency and build trust for future community engagement processes.
In the European context, some of the best practices mentioned are challenging due to data protection laws that prevent community staff from accessing information used for community monitoring. As a result, many communities stopped focusing on differences, such as languages or socioeconomic status, and returned to the basics of solving common problems such as affordable housing.
To close the panel, each member shared his or her hopes for future local government professionals. Eggermont encouraged local government professionals to "make things happen, take action, and implement" while Pluckhahn noted the need to rethink the way we [local governments] deliver services. Ange encouraged local government professionals to collaborate and noted that local government is better when we work together. "The more curious we are, the better the solution," added Towery.
Dan Weinheimer, assistant city manager of Beaverton, Oregon, USA, shared the impact of his first international trip with ICMA and the Global Engagement Committee. "I found the entire experience really interesting and educational. The conference in Hasselt was a great opportunity to see how EU countries approach emerging technologies and challenges. It was illustrative to see how different countries approach collaborating within the EU." Eager to take these lessons back to his community, Weinheimer added, "I really learned a lot from the approaches to AI. Most impactful was the concept of a digital twin city to use as a sandbox for project planning and impact evaluation. I've talked with ESRI (Environmental Systems Research Institute, Inc.) locally and my IT department (GIS is within that department) to see how we could approach this. Fingers crossed that we could create our own digital sandbox, it looks incredibly useful."
During the Exello.net conference, attendees took a tour of the conference site, the Corda Campus, which was successfully converted from a former Philips site into the leading tech campus in the center of the Euregio, becoming a breeding ground for the 250 companies and 5,000 people who work there daily.For over 35 years, ICMA has maintained international relationships with local government organizations around the world, like Exello.net, in pursuit of ICMA's goals of promoting good governance and its vision of creating thriving communities worldwide. Learn more about our global relationships and consider participating in their events to gain new perspective on the same issues you encounter every day. Contact [email protected] to get connected with any of our global partner organizations.
Learn more about Navigating Bias in Artificial Intelligence that was discussed at the Exello.net conference by visiting:
Navigating Bias in Artificial Intelligence
For more from ICMA's Belgium exchange, visit:
Ukrainian Veterans Reintegration Workshop