Management and leadership must go hand-in-hand for a local government manager to be truly effective.

Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul´s capital city in southern Brazil, has a consolidated culture of popular participation in its administration.

All of us know genuine leaders and probably a few phony ones.

On a day-to-day basis, public leaders are skilled at providing services to other public organizations and to the residents they serve

We asked our Members about the hardest thing they've ever done as a City Manager.

“International” is the first word in ICMA. My goal for ICMA has been to try to promote international as normal, not as something special. In the past few years, the ICMA Executive Board has made some changes to integrate the international aspect of the organization.

Working with the county, university, and school district, we determined the most important projects we could collectively tackle that would help us benefit our community. Seventy percent of our community is eligible for free or reduced lunches. We had an opportunity to do a first-ever youth master plan in San Marcos, and I was able to facilitate that.

When a local government places upright pianos in outdoor space, it's not an expensive thing. There wasn’t that much red tape; it did not require many permissions. The project showed that the government wants to have fun and we can have fun and we can do interesting things.