President’s Message Continued…

It is also time for me to refocus my energies back to the City of Yuma. Those who have come to know me know that I live, eat, and breathe Yuma. For the past couple of years, I’ve only been doing that about 50% of the time. With the current economic conditions, and although Yuma’s economy is still strong, it’s probably time to get back to work at my real job and keep the world’s attention focused on our community out here in the Southwest.

So why am I telling you all this, you ask? In the House of Delegates meeting at the Columbus conference, Past President Dennis Magee discussed an interesting concept in regard to the future of the Academy. What if we were to stop thinking of ourselves first as members of individual Societies and began to regard ourselves as members of the American Academy of Certified Public Managers® first? Kind of like considering ourselves an American as opposed to being a Texan or a Yuman--or something like a member of the American Academy of Certified Public Managers®, Florida Chapter.

What does this mean? Let me try to explain this issue that I care deeply about. I’ll try to convey Dennis’ thoughts through my worn-out brain’s interpretation. I guess in concept it means that we need to think of ourselves as Academy members first and foremost with an allegiance to our home Societies.

To build on Dennis’ idea, I recommended that we form an Ad-Hoc committee of interested Past Academy Presidents and dedicated Society representatives to begin to look at how we can change the way we think about ourselves, the way we’re structured, and the way we do business. No one knows the trials, tribulations, heartache, pleasures and joy leading our great organization can bring than these individuals.

As we all know, we originally organized ourselves as a "bottom up" organization, instead of “top down.”  Actually, we’re a middle feeding both up and down type of organization. Our local Societies feed information up to the Academy and down to the Chapters (if they exist in particular states). Unfortunately, our system sometimes doesn’t seem to be working as well as it was designed or intended to do.

We’re an organization that has reached its 20th year. We’ve grown beyond the toddler years, through adolescence, and now we’re entering adulthood. Perhaps we aren’t the same organization we were in the 1980’s. Our membership base has changed; time and circumstances have changed; and perhaps we need to change a little bit too.

To form the committee, a challenge was sent to all Society and Past Academy Presidents to work on a task force to further explore Dennis’ ideas. Some folks tried to derail the process before it got started by offering their opinions about the final product before we’d even formed a committee. But, in the end, we had several dedicated members step forward and offer their talents to work on this important issue. Those academy members that stepped up are Dennis Magee, Tom Patterson, Ron Buchholz, Bill Herman, Larry Totten, Dennis Magee, Nancy DeWitt, Bobby Ann Clark, George Askew, Debbie Smith, Jeff Kramer, Keith Heaton, Jerry McCarthy, Charlene Cutting, Fred Levinson, David Osborne, Becky Bryant, and Deb Bourbeau.

Now, to the point, after a lot of soul searching, I’ve decided that as my year is winding down it wouldn’t be right for me to spearhead this project. I feel that this should be one of President Steve’s committees, and we have agreed that his Presidency will oversee this special team.

My thanks to those members who have volunteered. I’ll be right there working with you, as a member of the team, when we get rolling early next year.

So, as I wrap up my final President’s Message, I’d like to take this opportunity to thank all our Academy members for making this a very memorable year. I’d also like to thank those close friends that have been there when I needed them most: Ron, Bill, Larry, Jeff, Deb, Debbie, and Becky--I couldn’t have lived through it without you. We are the strong organization we are because of you.

The years ahead will be challenging. We will have to find new and more efficient ways of doing things. We will have to learn to change as the times change, adapt to our changing membership base. And we’ll do this and more because we ARE Certified Public Managers®--the best and the brightest public sector managers in the world.

All the best to my CPM family, always!

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