The awards issue gives us the chance to celebrate remarkable colleagues and communities—and to reflect on the values that have shaped professional local government management across generations.

When we gather in Long Beach, California, for the 2026 ICMA Annual Conference, we will honor the people and programs that show what excellence looks like today. We are doing something special this year to honor our award winners. Rather than scattering awards across the general sessions each day, we have a special award ceremony and reception planned in the main hall on Monday afternoon. This is a time to recognize your colleagues—from those celebrating 60 years in the profession and the Distinguished Service Award recipients who have shaped the profession into what it is today, to the Early Career Leadership Award winner who will go on to shape the future, as well as the innovative programs reshaping how we serve our communities.

The names attached to our professional awards make that celebration especially meaningful. Take a moment to read more about the extraordinary people for whom the awards are named. Mark E. Keane, L. P. Cookingham, Buford M. Watson Jr., Stephen B. Sweeney, William H. Hansell Jr., and Martha Perego remind us that our profession has always advanced because individuals chose to lead, mentor, teach, advocate, and serve with integrity. An award named for one of these leaders does more than recognize an accomplishment. It connects today’s honorees to a history of service and sets a standard for those who will follow.

This year, we add an important chapter to that history with the Good Governance Award, established in honor of Dr. John Nalbandian, Robert J. O’Neill Jr., ICMA-CM, and Jan Perkins, ICMA-CM. Over decades of scholarship, professional leadership, teaching, consulting, and direct service, they have helped our profession better understand and support the council–staff partnership. It is fitting that the first recipient, Kimbra D. McCarthy, city manager of Mountain View, California, will receive this recognition in her home state.

The Good Governance Award recognizes that governance is the foundation beneath all that we do. Professional managers bring expertise, continuity, ethical judgment, and the capacity to turn policy into results. Elected officials bring the authority of the people. They listen to residents, weigh competing values, make choices, and establish the community’s direction. Our role is not to replace that democratic work, but to help elected leaders do it well—and then to ensure that the organization carries out their decisions effectively, fairly, and transparently.

That partnership is essential. We cannot do this work alone. Elected officials are the source of our legitimacy as professionals. They give democratic authority to the priorities we pursue and the public resources we steward. In turn, we help create the conditions in which a governing body can succeed: clear information, candid advice, respect for every member, disciplined follow-through, and an organization prepared to deliver. When elected officials and professional staff understand their roles, respect one another’s responsibilities, and work toward shared goals, the community sees a government capable of both representation and performance.

Trust grows from that alignment. Residents may not see every staff analysis, one-on-one conversation, budget workshop, or operational decision that makes effective governing possible. But they experience the result. They see whether priorities are clear, decisions are explained, commitments are honored, services are reliable, and public institutions act with competence and integrity. Trust is built when the governing body and the organization function as a team—not by avoiding disagreement, but by navigating it honestly and constructively in service to the whole community.

The other professionals and programs recognized in this issue bring the same promise to life in different ways. They develop new talent, advance the profession, strengthen equity and inclusion, protect health and safety, build partnerships, promote sustainability, and demonstrate strategic leadership. Their achievements deserve celebration. They also invite each of us to ask how our own work can strengthen the institutions and relationships on which our communities depend.

I hope you will take time to read about each of our 2026 honorees and the communities they serve. Their stories connect the best of our history with the best of our profession today. I look forward to celebrating them—and the enduring partnership at the heart of good local government—when we come together in Long Beach.

JULIA D. NOVAK, ICMA-CM, is executive director of ICMA.