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Browse more than 80 sessions at GFOA's 119th Annual Conference in Washington, DC.

The ability to lead has never really been a function of your title. Rather, it’s about personal responsibility, accountability, and ethical influence. The best leaders recognize they need an appropriate mix of professional and personal attributes to engage their team. 

This session will explore essential leadership traits, the importance of personal branding, and how to create a culture of care that engages and activates the discretionary effort that all team members possess in order to achieve organizational objectives. Participants will learn about leading with integrity, how to inspire others, and apply the principles of responsibility and accountability in their daily interactions to help achieve deeper connections with the members of their team.

Differentiate between accountability, responsibility, and authority and their impact on leadership.

Identify and incorporate essential leadership traits that enhance effectiveness.

Summarize and utilize ethical leadership principles to create a culture of care and engagement.

The Leader in You: Creating a Culture of Care and Engagement Through Responsibility, Accountability, and Authority

Leadership, Ethics, and Trust

While technology can improve efficiency through automation, true process improvement comes from changing organizational roles, policies, and with using technology appropriately. However, this change can be difficult to initiate and even more difficult to sustain. 

This session will explain how tools like artificial intelligence (AI), robotic process automation (RPA), and enterprise resource planning (ERP) can support larger initiatives that also involve policy and process modernization. Speakers will explain the critical ingredients for successful change and provide lessons learned from their own project success and failure. Attend to learn how you can harness new and existing technologies and create a culture of improvement.

Identify how current technology can help improve business process.

Explore change management strategies for sustained change.

Create a culture that supports improvement initiatives at all levels of the organization.

New and Improved: How to Initiate Lasting Change

Business Process Improvement

In an era of escalating challenges and complex threats, governments must be prepared for a range of risks that can disrupt communities and strain resources. This session will delve into the most significant emerging risks facing local governments today, such as natural catastrophes, cybersecurity threats, and the elusive "unknown unknowns" that can arise without warning. 

Speakers will discuss the importance of maintaining robust rainy day funds, securing appropriate commercial insurance, and developing financial strategies to mitigate these risks. Attendees will learn how to enhance their financial resilience through proactive fiscal management, ensuring their communities are well prepared to face both foreseeable and unforeseen challenges.

Identify both longstanding and emerging risks facing local governments.

Discuss the benefits of maintaining a rainy day fund to mitigate risk.

Describe how local governments can maintain financial resilience by managing their risks proactively.

Unknown Unknowns: How to Plan for New Risks

Risk Assessment

As more and more governments struggle to retain and recruit employees, many are realizing that they need to increase pay for their employees, but are unsure about exactly how to go about doing so. How much should your organization increase compensation levels? Is it appropriate to pay bonuses or establish market rates to compete for qualified staff? And how do you determine what the appropriate market rate is? 

This session will explain how you can revise your government's approach to compensation and how to communicate changes to staff and elected officials. Speakers will offer advice and insight on these questions and more to help you develop a game plan for adjusting compensation levels in your organization.

Identify the key factors to consider when making decisions about employee compensation levels in your organization.

Describe the challenges related to increasing employee compensation and the risks of not doing so.

Summarize how other local governments have implemented employee compensation increases.

The Price is Right? How to Set Compensation Levels in Government

Compensation and Benefits

When it comes to personnel budgeting, few topics generate as much debate as how to approach budgeting for vacant positions. Should you budget the salary or wage on the low end or high end of the pay scale? Should you budget assuming the position will be filled for the entire budget period? Should you assume that some positions will become vacant through attrition during the budget period? While there's not a singular right answer to any of these questions, there are benefits and risks associated with the different approaches. 

At this session, panelists will discuss the pros and cons of the various methods for budgeting vacant positions so you can determine the best one for your organization.

Define turnover, attrition, and vacancy savings as they relate to personnel budgeting.

Describe the ways local governments budget for vacant positions.

Summarize the benefits and risks associated with different approaches to budgeting for vacant positions.

To Budget, or Not to Budget...for Vacancy Savings

Budgeting and Forecasting

Not only are large capital projects expensive, they are also usually very visible to the community. Some, like the construction of new parks or community centers may benefit from overwhelming public support, while others like rehabilitation of roads or bridges may place significant inconvenience on residents. With all projects, finance professionals need to work with other leaders to engage the public, communicate project information, and provide transparency into decision-making.

In this session, speakers will discuss how to tell your story more effectively, understand your audience, present appropriate information, keep stakeholders engaged, and communicate key messages related to prioritization, importance of asset maintenance, implications for service levels, and cost impacts related to project finances.

Learn how to tell the story of your capital plan to multiple stakeholders.

Align all stakeholders on key elements of capital plan implementation.

Develop strategies for communicating project information, including impact to the community and ongoing services.

Construction Zone: How to Communicate Capital Project Information to Your Community

Capital Planning and Asset Management

Collaboration and trust are essential for governments to build and sustain thriving communities. Partnering with the public is important for understanding community needs, identifying solutions, and balancing competing priorities. Similarly, working together across departments can maximize the use of limited resources. Trust is crucial to ensure that all stakeholders participate in the budget process and unite to support shared goals. 

This session will highlight governments that have built structures to support a more collaborative budget process. Panelists will discuss the challenges they faced along the way, the strategies they used to overcome them, how they cultivated trust, and how other governments can learn from their experiences.

Describe the benefits of budget collaboration.

Explain how to overcome barriers that hinder teamwork.

Share examples of local governments that have implemented a more cooperative approach to budgeting.

Come Together: Building a More Collaborative Budget Process

Trust is an asset as important as any that can be found on any government balance sheet. However, by several different measures, trust in government has decreased in recent years. This lack of trust can hamper the ability for local governments to provide needed services to the community, raise sufficient revenue, or demonstrate value. Similarly, distrust among colleagues within a government can stifle collaboration. 

GFOA’s Code of Ethics provides a playbook for how finance professionals can earn the trust of the public and their colleagues. At this session, learn the key elements of the code and how it can help you be most effective in your role.

Identify the key elements of GFOA’s Code of Ethics.

Discuss how GFOA’s Code of Ethics can help public servants earn the trust of the public and their colleagues.

Explain how the lack of trust among colleagues and from the public can negatively impact a local government’s operations.

Trust in Government: Applying GFOA's Code of Ethics

Earlier this year, GFOA released a report that delves into the tactics or “games" used by participants in the budget process to secure more resources, such as "The Padding Play," where budget requestors inflate their needs. This session will outline the other games budget officers encounter and provide advice on how to contain and even defeat these tactics. 

Panelists will share how they have leveled up their budget leadership skills to establish a budget process and decision-making environment that discourages gameplay.

Identify the different tactics budget stakeholders use to "game" the budget process to their advantage.

Establish a budget process that discourages gameplay.

Develop a more collaborative budget decision-making environment.

Level Up: How to Get Your Budget Stakeholders to Stop Playing Games

The traditional local government budget is expressed in both departments and line items such as "salaries and wages," "materials and supplies," and "professional services." While these descriptions are often useful for monitoring spending and preparing financial reports, they often make it difficult for governments to have meaningful conversations about how best to spend its limited resources or to adjust levels of service to meet demand. One way to address these challenges is to adopt a program-based approach to budgeting. 

Rather than organizing the budget around who provides the service, program-based budgeting communicates what an organization does (programs) and the value it can bring to the community (results). This session will feature speakers from local governments that have adopted a program-based approach and provide tips on how your government can "get with the program."

Explain the benefits of program-based budgeting.

Share examples of local governments that utilize program-based budgeting.

Outline steps to transition from line-item budgeting to program-based budgeting.

Get With the Program: Moving Away from Line-Item Budgets

This session is designed for aspiring and current leaders in government finance who aim to accelerate their careers and enhance their leadership impact. Participants will explore essential qualities that define successful leaders in the public finance sector. Panelists will discuss various leadership styles, strategies for navigating organizational dynamics, and methods they have used to influence positive change within their organizations. 

Attendees will gain insights into balancing fiscal responsibility with public service mandates and learn how to overcome common obstacles to drive organizational success.

Describe key leadership qualities essential for success in government finance roles.

Develop effective career advancement strategies, including goal setting, networking, and mentorship.

Apply leadership principles to influence organizational change and drive performance.

Overcome challenges unique to public finance leadership, such as ethical considerations and resource limitations.

Young Professionals Network: Leadership Skills to Accelerate Your Career in Public Finance

With the expiration of several huge COVID-19 pandemic era programs, government finance staff are tasked with winding down the largest federal funding packages ever received by local governments. This session will provide insight into the close-out requirements of the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) Fiscal Recovery Funds and other federal funding trends. 

Speakers will also discuss the 2024 Uniform Guidance updates and the 2025 Compliance Supplement and highlight strategies to assist governments in addressing common single audit challenges.

Implement steps to successfully close out ARPA funding, including State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds (SLFRF).

Summarize the changes made to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Uniform Guidance in the 2024 update.

Identify key components to the 2025 Compliance Supplement.

The End of an ERA: Winding Down from ARPA

Accounting and Financial Reporting

For many governments, the budget process provides an opportunity to discuss priorities, goals, revenues, expenses, and services over the next year. However, it does not help prepare for large capital investments that may span fiscal years or where advanced planning multiple years in the future is required. For that governments also need an effective capital improvement plan (CIP). 

The CIP process, focused on individual projects, will need to consider rehabilitation of existing assets, developing new assets, multiple funding sources, potential debt issuance, longer lead times for contracts and procurement, and collaboration across multiple departments. Speakers will discuss how to begin improving tomorrow through better planning today, focusing on best practices in capital planning.

Discuss the basics of capital improvement plans and planning.

Describe the benefits of long-term capital planning and its associated revenue and budget models.

Capital Planning 101: Beginning Your Capital Improvement Planning Journey

Internal service functions like finance, budget, procurement, human resources, and information technology serve important internal customers. However, it can be difficult to develop policies, set clear expectations, respond to feedback, and deliver excellent results. It's also a challenge to allocate funding for these internal services when compared to programs that directly benefit the public. 

This session will examine the pros and cons of establishing internal service funds, discuss strategies for allocating costs, define program parameters, and highlight the role of service-level agreements in communicating with stakeholders and gaining organizational buy-in.

Discuss the benefits and challenges of treating finance, HR, procurement, and other administrative functions as internal services.

Share examples of local governments that have established service-level agreements for finance and HR functions.

Describe how to get department stakeholders on board with allocating costs for finance and HR.

The Customer is Always Right: Defining and Managing Internal Services

ERP Systems and Technology

When examining pension plans, many stakeholders and the media tend to zero in on one particular number: the funded ratio. However, the funded ratio tends to oversimplify pension plans, leaving out important details about their health, funding, and trajectories over time. 

Attend this session to hear a discussion on funding levels of retirement plans, related public perception, and what is truly important about achieving funding goals and plan affordability over time.

Explain the shortcomings of the funded ratio as an indicator of a pension plan's health.

Discuss alternative approaches to conversations about long-term pension plan funding goals and plan affordability.

Ignoring the Bright Lights: Going Beyond the Funded Ratio

Small governments are often faced with the same complex challenges as larger ones, but usually with far fewer resources. Budgets are strapped, staff are pulled in too many different directions, and community needs are multiplying. So what's a small government to do? Rather than ignore their problems, hope they'll go away, and let the next person in charge figure it out, small governments can partner to share resources. 

This session will highlight examples of such "public-public partnerships," including how they were formed and how each of the partners are benefiting.

Discuss case studies of local governments that have partnered to solve shared challenges.

Identify potential obstacles and risks involved in partnering with other local governments.

Evaluate opportunities for your local government to partner with other local governments to solve shared problems.

Public-Public Partnerships: Case Studies in Small Government Service Sharing

Public transit plays a vital role in communities of all sizes. In small towns, medium-sized suburbs, and big cities, residents rely on buses, trains, and paratransit to get to work, school, healthcare appointments, and more. But providing this important service is not easy. Today, public transit agencies are grappling with how to continue providing the level of service their customers rely on without increasing fares to the point they are unaffordable. 

At this session, hear from public transit leaders about how they are addressing challenges like increasing capital equipment costs, growing labor shortages, uncertainty with grant programs, and change in demand while keeping services affordable for their customers.

Discuss the challenges facing public transit organizations and their financial impact.

Identify the primary sources of revenue for public transit organizations.

Describe how public transit organizations are addressing different concerns.

Almost all governments post financial reports to their website to inform the public and promote transparency goals. However, do these reports actually provide information that is timely, accessible, and informative for the community? With modern technology, leading governments can create dashboards that offer genuine financial transparency. 

This session will explain how you can develop your transparency portal, identify the most relevant data to publish, build links to your enterprise resource planning (ERP) system, and generate interest among the public. Speakers will also discuss lessons learned in establishing their own portal and how they overcame common legal, logistical, and technological hurdles.

Identify relevant information for a public transparency dashboard.

Evaluate processes to produce timely financial information.

Leverage common tools in the market to accelerate transparency initiatives.

Housing is an issue challenging governments across North America. The circumstances in every community are slightly different, but the questions are similar. Do we have enough housing? Where should we build more? What type is needed? How can we keep it affordable? How affordable is affordable? Do we have the infrastructure to support it? In any case, housing is a problem that single governments cannot fix on their own. Doing so will require partnering with nonprofit organizations, private developers, and other governments. 

This session will highlight governments that have developed initiatives to address their housing challenges, with a focus on what resources are needed and how local government finance professionals can play a role in providing their communities with more housing options.

Describe the specific housing issues that are particularly challenging for many communities.

Share case studies of local governments that are addressing housing challenges in their communities and the level of success they are experiencing.

Discuss commonly-used housing strategies, the reasons for their use, and their pros and cons.

Identify internal and external partners that should be involved in developing your local government's housing strategy.

Homemade Solutions: Working to Solve the Housing Crisis

Thriving communities are not the focus of governments alone. Nonprofits, faith-based organizations, small businesses, and other community-based institutions often share similar goals. Providing grants to these organizations and businesses can be an effective way for governments to meet their objectives, but only if they take a strategic approach. To ensure they are maximizing their investment, governments must define their priorities and intended results, establish transparent processes for soliciting and reviewing applications, and monitor the effectiveness of the awarded grants. 

Speakers in this session will share their experiences with budgeting for grant programs, offering insights into how awarding grants to community-based organizations can drive meaningful outcomes and help support long-term community progress.

Share examples of local governments that have established grant programs to help address community priorities.

Discuss ways to maximize the impact of grants that local governments make to community organizations.

Describe the process of soliciting and evaluating grant proposals, executing agreements, and monitoring grantees.

Kickstarting Results: Applying Procurement Principles to Grantmaking 

Procurement

GFOA provides education, networking, mentorship, certification, career development, and many resources for members. However, we also realize that in many organizations, formal membership in GFOA is only provided to the most senior level positions in the finance department. GFOA focuses on building financial management skills across entire organizations and is redefining its approach to membership. 

Attend this session to learn how you can extend the value of your GFOA membership and help others in your organization join GFOA's network.

Develop a strategy to include others from your organization in GFOA.

Identify GFOA resources to assist with your career development or that of your staff.

Explore leadership opportunities with GFOA and learn how you can get involved.

Bigger and Better: GFOA's New Approach to Membership

Most best practice recommendations on budgeting suggest that governments should allocate resources aligned with your community's priorities. But how do you know what those are? And what if their priorities won't actually contribute to a thriving community? 

In this session, speakers will discuss the advantages and disadvantages of a variety of methods used to gauge public sentiment. While this should not be the only consideration when making planning and budgeting decisions, it is often useful to understand how well the government is meeting the public's expectations. Using local government case studies, this session will show how your organization can collect feedback from all parts of the community to help inform its decision-making.

Identify effective methods to capture public opinion.

Provide examples of local governments that have used different methods to gauge community perception.

Discuss challenges associated with capturing public sentiment.

Information from the Real World: Understanding Public Priorities

Conventional wisdom around asset maintenance teaches us that the useful life of an asset is driven by how well we maintain the asset, but times have changed. Extreme climate conditions and weather events have led to decreasing asset life cycles, increasing need for investments in resilience, growing insurance gaps, increasing costs, and failing infrastructure. With these challenges in mind, governments need to consider what investments should be made today to address future climate risks. 

At this session, panelists will discuss the issues that may be keeping infrastructure planning and investment from meeting current and future needs and challenges, with the goal of finding opportunities to develop better and more timely plans for how to invest limited government resources in a changing world.

Identify the factors that are leading to diminishing asset life cycles.

Adapt operating and capital planning processes to account for shorter asset life cycles.

Discuss the role of natural assets and how they can contribute to community resilience planning.

Examine the issues that are hindering infrastructure planning efforts to meet modern challenges.

Find opportunities to develop better and more timely plans to ensure the resilience of communities.

Weather the Coming Storms: Infrastructure Planning for More Extreme Conditions

Procurement policies provide standards for purchasing goods and services while also navigate complex frameworks of legal, budgetary, management, and ethical requirements. Policies set clear expectations for roles, approvals, transparency, competition, decision-making, and code of conduct and must be evaluated regularly to ensure consistency with both the current business and legal environment. Unfortunately for many organizations, policies are either outdated, vague, or inaccessible to key stakeholders. 

Speakers in this session will provide a simple checklist to evaluate your own procurement policy and discuss strategies for incorporating best practices and modern approaches to procurement.

Understand key components of a procurement policy.

Develop strategies for improving your procurement policy.

For many finance professionals, embarking on an enterprise resource planning (ERP) project is not something they look forward to undertaking. Long hours, cost overruns, difficult vendors, and resistance to change are not pleasant experiences. However, with careful planning and a focus on organizational readiness, governments can take much of the pain out of ERP. 

In this session, speakers will provide participants with actionable strategies and insights to navigate the complexities of ERP implementation successfully. Topics for discussion include how to modernize policies, strategies for converting data, building a project budget, and working closely with end users to achieve ERP project success.

Define the key phases of an ERP implementation.

Identify and mitigate common implementation challenges.

Align your ERP system implementation with your business goals and objectives.

Overcoming ERPphobia: How to Confront Your Next Project

There is no single path to becoming a finance officer. GFOA's 25,000+ members have just as many different motivations, stories, and journeys that have led them to this stage in their careers. However, they all now share the responsibility for maintaining trust, supporting their community, and working to build sustainable organizations despite increasing pressure from political polarization, workforce challenges, and overall distrust of government. 

During this session, hear from several finance professionals about their career progression, how their experience puts them in a position to deal with current challenges, and what drives their dedication to the profession.

Explore the challenges of working in public finance.

Discuss professional development opportunities in the field.

As a budget professional, you and your team are anxious to embark on a journey to improve your budget process and implement best practice. However, your chief executive and/or elected officials are not on board. Knowing their support will be critical as you challenge the status quo and rethink past practice, what do you do? 

In this session, hear from leaders who have successfully reformed the budget process with support from the C-suite and elected officials, as well as those who worked to build that support. Speakers will provide strategies you can use to rethink current practices and improve budgeting in your organization.

Articulate the benefits of rethinking budgeting in terms that the chief executive and elected officials will appreciate.

Discuss strategies for how to gain the support of top leadership and decision-makers for rethinking budgeting.

Share examples of local governments that are rethinking budgeting with support from executive leadership and elected representatives.

Getting Everyone on the Bus for Budget Reform

The concept of "smart cities" isn't limited to large urban centers; it's about leveraging technology to enhance the quality of life and operational efficiency in any community. This session invites finance professionals from local governments of all sizes to explore how integrating technologies—such as Internet of Things devices, data analytics, and digital services—can transform financial management and service delivery. 

Attendees will learn how to lead technology initiatives that align with their community's needs and resources. By demystifying "smart city" concepts, this session makes technology integration accessible and practical for towns, cities, and counties alike.

Discuss how your local government can utilize technology to improve financial management and service delivery.

Share examples of local governments that have leveraged technology to improve operations and achieve better outcomes.

Describe different technologies and their application to local government operations.

Smart Cities: Rethinking the Role of Technology in Everyday Life with the GFOA Urban Forum

Governments engage with many different external service providers who all play a role in managing their investment program. These providers include investment advisers, broker-dealers, as well as custodians or safekeeping agents. This session will review GFOA’s best practices and resources on selecting and managing these external investment professionals. 

After this session, you will know the right questions to ask to determine the investment professionals your organization needs to support its investment program.

Describe the roles and responsibilities of different external investment professionals.

Determine what types of professionals are right for your investment program.

Discuss the importance of custodians and safekeeping.

Develop an RFI or RFP for investment advisers, broker-dealers, and custodian/safekeeping services.

Develop procedures to effectively manage professionals that are part of your investment team.

Who Does What: Public Investment Professionals

Treasury and Investment Management

While asset management is important for all types of local governments, it is particularly crucial for utilities, as assets are the means by which they provide the services their customers rely on. If an asset breaks down or fails, it can affect the entire delivery system and lead to service interruptions. Over the long-term, continued asset failures can lead to growing distrust among customers. Utilities can avoid this scenario by developing a proactive asset management renewal and replacement program to plan for and maintain critical infrastructure and equipment. 

Panelists will share their experience implementing a proactive asset management program, including challenges they encountered and how they overcame them. This session is sponsored by GFOA's Utility Finance Forum and will include an opportunity for member networking. The session is open to all conference attendees.

Explain the benefits of implementing a proactive asset management program.

Identify technology tools, including GIS and other asset inventory tracking systems, that utilities can use to enhance asset management.

Discuss the basic components of an asset management program, including conducting condition assessments, developing replacement schedules, and funding regular preventive maintenance.

Share examples of utilities that have implemented successful asset management programs.

119th Annual Conference Sessions: Risk Assessment

Browse by topic:

Sessions for Sunday, June 29

No risk assessment sessions for June 29

Sessions for Monday, June 30

Navigating FEMA Before and After a Disaster

Cyber Risk Savvy: GFOA's 2025 Cybersecurity Update

Sessions for Tuesday, July 1

Big Questions for Small Governments: Appropriate Reserve Levels Based on Risk

Unknown Unknowns: How to Plan for New Risks

Sessions for Wednesday, July 2

No risk assessment sessions for July 2