Years of groundwork by ICMA México-Latinoamérica, ICMA’s office in Mexico, have paid off with a significant step forward for professional management in the country and the region. On February 7, the governing council (Ayuntamiento) in Navolato, in the state of Sinaloa, created the position of Municipal Administrator as a nonpolitical council appointee. And on February 26 Carlos Ernesto Acosta was appointed as the first person to hold the position.

Navolato’s council created the position at a special meeting through a change in its internal organizational regulations. The new regulations prohibit the administrator from participating in any political activities during his or her tenure and requires that in order to be appointed, he or she must not have held elected office or a party position for five years.

Navolato has a population of 135,700 and a budget of US $30 million. Its main economic activity is agribusiness and it is located just 15 miles from Culiacan, Sinaloa´s capital.

Although Navolato is not the first Mexican municipality to establish a municipal administrator position (Tijuana had it twice, in 2002-2004 and 2007-2010), it is the first one to regulate political activity in this way. The requirements are particularly noteworthy in a political system where all government chief executives are strong mayors and virtually all management positions are held by the mayor’s political allies.

The regulations also provide that the mayor needs a two-thirds vote of the council to appoint the administrator and a simple majority to dismiss.

ICMA México-Latinoamérica (ICMA-ML) started to work in the state of Sinaloa more than ten years ago at the invitation of the State Council for Economic Development (CODESIN). About nine years ago, ICMA-ML started to provide technical assistance to Navolato in institutional capacity building, finance, budgeting, performance measurement, service delivery, and other areas.

In Mexico, ICMA-ML provides

• Resources, information, and training on good governance through its Spanish-language website and other services
• Assessment instruments and other programs that strengthen subnational institutional capacity
• Opportunities for interaction among Mexican administrators, officials, and local government organizations and interaction between these parties and their counterparts in the United States.

By involving ICMA members in its activities, ICMA-ML also facilitates the sharing of knowledge and experience among colleagues. And through the years, a number of ICMA members have participated in technical assistance delegations and in conferences to promote professional management in Sinaloa and elsewhere in Mexico.

In Navolato, Mayor Miguel Calderon closed the special meeting of the council by saying "I am convinced that this is a good decision, which I applaud. This vote shows that we are willing to break a paradigm, an anchor that holds us in time. It is time that such an anchor let us move forward . . . it requires courage, even more when Navolato is the only municipality that is taking the chance to make a move of this magnitude. Congratulations!"

To learn more, visit the ICMA International website and the “ International Development” topic in the Knowledge Network, or email international@icma.org.