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April 24, 2003
54th City & County Management Conference
I was in attendance at the 54th City & County Management Conference, which was convened to discuss the issues surrounding Community-Building: Design and Dialogue. To begin the event John Nalbandian who is the chair of the department of public administration at the University of Kansas talked about the two major themes that occurring within community, first the attempt to build a sense of community or in some cases recapture an older tradition of community, and second the ideas of modernization the organization, privatization, and flexibility within modern administration. One of the over arching themes addressed throughout the conference was the idea of the value of public service and what it brings to the stewardship that is modern public administration.
The mayor of the city of Lawrence David Dunfield said something that really made me think about the ideas between the lifespan of elected officials and the reliance they have on professional staff that is the only steady experienced part of government that keeps the learning curve from starting over every election cycle. David expressed the idea that with out professional staff nothing would ever get done from administration to administration because no commonality would exist. This made me think about the nature of elected office and if from time to time the leader changes do the overall visions of the organization really change?
224 words posted by nels lindahl at 06:22 PM
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