The 1993 Advanced Government Finance Institute.

• Author: Gleason, Nancy
• Position: State of the Art

Forty-nine municipal, county and state finance officers from 23 states, two Canadian provinces and the District of Columbia gathered for the Government Finance Officers Association's (GFOA's) Advanced Government Finance Institute, July 18 through 23, 1993. This year the Institute marked its eighth anniversary and its fourth year on the Madison campus of the University of Wisconsin (UW).

The Institute's week-long series of classroom lectures and colleague discussions gives participating state and local government finance officials the chance to escape their day-to-day activities and dilemmas to examine the challenges they face in all facets of their profession. University professors, GFOA staff, and public- and private-sector professionals lead Institute sessions. The program topics--the emerging global economy; changing demographics; developments in finance, budgeting and accounting; and managerial concerns, such as leadership, motivation, ethics and communication--surface outside as well as inside the classroom.

Located in the heart of Madison's vibrant community and nestled on Lake Mendota, the UW campus provides a stimulating, academic setting for the Institute. Participants are housed in the Wisconsin Center Guest House and take all meals together, a cohesive factor which adds significantly to the Institute's success: participants find it easy to linger over dinner or have an ice cream on the lakeside terrace to continue discussions begun in Institute sessions. A short walk from the Guest House takes participants to the UW classroom facilities, the capitol square for a concert, or the shops and cafes of State Street.

1993 Participants and Faculty

From the assistant city manager for finance and administration of a Missouri city of 23,100 people to the chief financial officer of Oregon's Department of Transportation serving 2.8 million people, participants' diverse backgrounds contribute to the exchange of innovative solutions to familiar predicaments. Most of the 1993 participants worked for a city, town or county. Others came from a state agency or a variety of special districts and authorities, including school districts, transit and port authorities, and retirement funds. While jurisdictions of all sizes were represented, nearly a third of the participants' governments had populations of more than 500,000. Two-thirds of the participants served in the upper echelons of local government finance--chief financial officer...