Category Archives: Collaborations

AzCCL co-sponsors A Day of Civic Action

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National Conference on Citizenship

This year's National Conference on Citizenship is the first held outside of Washington, D.C.

You are invited to A Day of Civic Action on Thursday, September 22 at the Wyndham Phoenix Hotel.

The Arizona Center for Civic Leadership is sponsoring the Civic Insights Breakfast, the first event in a half-day schedule packed with new information, ideas, and strategies. The breakfast, which launches the day from 7:30-9:00 a.m., will feature a presentation of new insights on civic leadership from local and national research.

There is no charge for the Civic Insights Breakfast, though registration is required. The breakfast also sets the stage for the release of the second edition of the Arizona Civic Health Index, a report developed by the Arizona We Want Institute at the Center for the Future of Arizona.

Following the breakfast, an expert panel and the audience will discuss “Arizona’s civic moment, civic leadership, and citizen potential.” Capping the day will be the Arizona Town Hall Fall Luncheon.

A Day of Civic Action is presented in conjunction with the National Conference on Citizenship, which is being held in Arizona on September 22-23 with the theme “Redefining America’s Social Compact.” The Center for the Future of Arizona is the local sponsor of the high-profile national event.

A Day of Civic Action is collaboratively sponsored by the Arizona Center for Civic Leadership, Arizona Town Hall, Center for the Future of Arizona, and Valley Leadership.

Register for A Day of Civic Action

Register for the National Conference on Citizenship

Gabe Zimmerman Public Service Awards to honor exceptional public employees

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Gabe Zimmerman

Gabe Zimmerman served as the community-outreach coordinator for the office of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. (Photo courtesy Giffords for Congress)

The Center for the Future of Arizona has created a new initiative, the Gabe Zimmerman Public Service Awards, to recognize the finest non-elected public employees at all levels of government in Arizona. The awards program is named in honor of the 30 year-old congressional staffer who died in the January attack targeting Representative Gabrielle Giffords.

The awards will be given in three categories:

  • Leadership: Recognizing the long-term achievements and efforts of public servants who have displayed and sustained leadership contributions throughout their careers, with a minimum of 20 years of public service.
  • Innovation: Recognizing the achievements and efforts of public servants who have developed and contributed to implementing significant ideas and innovations that benefit Arizona citizens.
  • Civic Engagement: Recognizing the achievements and efforts of public servants who have materially helped inform, engage, and connect citizens in ways that encourage their active participation in 21st-century democracy and community-building.

Announcing the program, the Center for the Future of Arizona observed that its polling to develop The Arizona We Want citizens’ agenda had found deep dissatisfaction among Arizonans with the performance and responsiveness of their elected officials. Likewise, the Center found that Arizonans hold consistently low marks on several indicators of civic engagement, such as voter registration and turnout and Arizonans’ attentiveness to the news. In response to these findings, the Center created the Gabe Zimmerman Public Service Awards and the Five Communities Project, a separate, complementary program to recognize communities that are effectively spurring civic engagement.

Recipients of the awards will be recognized at the 2011 National Conference on Citizenship, which is being held in Phoenix on September 22-23.

Nominations for the awards are due very soon–August 1st. Eligible applicants include public employees who work for:

  • Cities and towns
  • Counties
  • Special districts
  • Agencies of the executive and legislative branches of state government
  • Tribal governments
  • Personal staff of members of the Arizona Congressional delegation.

Valley Leadership announces its 33rd class

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Valley LeadershipValley Leadership, one of Arizona’s notable regional leadership-training organizations, is a vital partner for the Arizona Center for Civic Leadership. Last week, Valley Leadership announced selection of its 33rd class–56 individuals who will attend a nine-month Leadership Institute and leave ready to be even more effective in their communities.

Valley Leadership’s focus on informing Institute participants about key community issues and developing participants’ leadership skills complements the Center’s emphasis on statewide issues and preparing future state-level leaders. Indeed, among participants in the Flinn-Brown Civic Leadership Academy’s first class this spring were several Leadership Institute alumni, including three members of the Valley Leadership board of directors, along with Valley Leadership’s executive director, Frank McCune.

A membership list for Valley Leadership Class 33 is available in a press release posted on the Valley Leadership website. Congratulations to Valley Leadership.

KJZZ invites listeners to serve as expert sources

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Fronteras - The Changing Americas Desk

The Public Insight Network, a nationwide initiative to connect journalists with more of the knowledgeable individuals they most prize as sources, has come to Arizona, giving the state’s leaders and residents a new opportunity to share their expertise.

Fronteras: The Changing Americas Desk, based at public-radio station KJZZ, now has a reporter whose primary responsibility is gathering “tips, resources, expert analysis, and personal stories” from the public and delivering them to journalists at KJZZ and to the broader Public Insight Network (PIN). Nick Blumberg serves as manager of PIN’s southwest resources; nationwide, PIN’s 100,000 resources are being accessed by dozens of news outlets, including top public-radio stations, newspapers like the Charlotte Observer and the Miami Herald, and such organizations as the Media Consortium and ProPublica.

“This new project provides KJZZ listeners and reporters an opportunity to connect in new ways,” said Blumberg in a news release. “This gives listeners a chance to lead reporters to stories and sources that have been overlooked or out of reach.”

Individuals interested in becoming sources for PIN fill out a brief online form explaining their expertise and identifying potential topics for coverage. PIN especially wants to know:

  • What are some exciting (or troubling) new developments in the topics or areas you know a fair bit about?
  • What are the most difficult or intriguing questions in the areas you follow most closely? (In other words: What questions aren’t people asking, but should be?)

“We’re living in an age where people are clamoring to be heard,” explained Mark Moran, KJZZ’s associate general manager of news and editorial strategy. “This new initiative gives our community a voice, a means of sharing information and news about issues that are important to them.”

Blumberg can also be reached directly at nblumberg@rioradio.org or (480) 774-8231.

Teach for America: Impacting education and building leaders

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Teach for America - PhoenixTeach For America trains and supports outstanding recent college graduates and young professionals who commit to teach for two years in urban and rural public schools and become lifelong educational leaders.

This fall, 325 corps members, who comprise one of the largest Teach For America cohorts in the nation, will reach some 18,000 students in the organization’s Phoenix region. Amplifying their efforts are substantial collaborations between TFA and partner organizations, such as Arizona State University, the Helios Education Foundation, and the State of Arizona, as well as the community activities of more than 500 TFA alumni who live and work in the state.

Those alumni are key to Teach For America’s long-term vision for Arizona under Pearl Chang Esau, executive director of the Phoenix region since 2008. TFA’s leadership expects the number of alumni in Arizona to more than double in the next few years and plans to focus efforts on creating partnerships to help alumni become more involved in civic leadership at all levels. These alumni represent a ready resource for local and regional leadership programs across the state.

How will your community achieve The Arizona We Want?

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Five Communities Project (Photo by Flickr user lou)

The Center for the Future of Arizona has launched the Five Communities Project to encourage the development of “bold new ideas for achieving The Arizona We Want.”

The Center for the Future of Arizona is inviting communities to submit proposals that describe how they could address one or more of the citizen-articulated goals identified by the Gallup Arizona Poll. The five communities selected to work with CFA will develop and implement their plans over three years, applying with CFA for national funding.

The goals identified by the Gallup Arizona Poll:

  • Create quality jobs for all Arizonans;
  • Educate Arizonans of all ages for the 21st century;
  • Make Arizona “the place to be” for talented young people;
  • Provide health insurance for all, with payment assistance for those who need it;
  • Protect Arizona’s natural environment, water supplies, and open spaces;
  • Build a modern, effective transportation system and infrastructure;
  • Increase civic involvement;
  • Increase citizens’ connnection to one another.

A community is broadly defined in the initiative. Municipalities, school districts, tribal communities, economic-development regions, religious communities, large neighborhood organizations, or other entities with clear geographic boundaries are all encouraged to submit plans and participate in this important project.

Underlying the Five Communities Project, CFA explains, is a principle articulated in a recent Case Foundation report:

In this report, Case proposed using approaches beyond voting and volunteering to focus on the “process of civic engagement where ordinary people come together, deliberate, and take action on problems or issues they themselves have defined as important and in ways they deem appropriate.”

If your community is interested in participating, visit the Five Communities Project website. The deadline for submitting letters of intent is Monday, May 16, 2011.

Working together across the border

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View of the Arizona border with Sonora, Mexico, near Bisbee. (Photo by Flickr user threadedthoughts)

Few situations are as challenging for civic leaders as coordinating and collaborating across national borders. But there are many efforts, and some successes.

The Arizona State University North American Center for Transborder Studies is partnering with the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars to draw attention to success stories. Together, the two groups have started a new initiative, the “Awards for U.S.-Mexico Cross-Border Cooperation and Innovation,” which will recognize leadership and collaboration in areas as diverse as transportation planning, education, public safety and the arts.

From the Wilson Center’s announcement:

Awards will honor cooperation and innovation in the fields of public safety, transportation planning, environmental stewardship, education, health, and the arts, among others. Awardees will be selected by a prestigious selection committee, reflecting the bi-national identity, diversity, and spirit of the border—with members from business, government, academia, and the non-profit sector.

The deadline for submissions of nominations is Monday, April 18, 2011.

More information about the awards and how to nominate or apply for the award is available on the Wilson Center’s website.

Do you know civic leaders who are making a real difference in difficult times? We’d like to know their stories–Please send information to Emily Rajakovich.

Award-winning local leadership training

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Participants in the Apache Junction Leadership Institute listen to Mayor John Insalaco on the program's opening night. (Photo courtesy City of Apache Junction)

Apache Junction Leadership Institute

One of more than 50 local and regional leadership programs in Arizona is the Apache Junction Leadership Institute, founded in 1998 to prepare citizens to serve on a board or commission.

The city has held 12 Institutes, with a total of 235 participants. Each Institute includes nine program sessions, and attendees are required to attend at least one City Council meeting and one Planning and Zoning Commission meeting. During the sessions, attendees take part in interactive activities and case studies to educate participants about the city’s budget and simulations of the governing process.

A mark of the program’s success, graduates currently fill 70 percent of all city board and commission slots. In 2004, the institute received a Program Excellence Award at the 90th annual conference of the International City/County Management Association.

For more information about the Apache Junction Leadership Institute, contact Patrick Brenner, Apache Junction community relations manager, at (480) 474-5080.

Must-have civic-leadership resources

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As we continue building out the website for the Arizona Center for Civic Leadership, we’ll occasionally use this space to remind you where on the site–and beyond–you can find various resources from the Center. Those resources include our directory of local and regional civic-leadership programs and our Reading Room, where you’ll find key reports and institutional resources with important information about Arizona.

The latest addition is a page on the site featuring resources for members of the Arizona Civic Leadership Collaborative. The first resource we’ve added to the page is a presentation from the initial gathering of Collaborative participants, where the Center’s director, Nancy Welch, introduced the Center and gathered feedback to help drive the Collaborative’s activities.

You can also find documents and presentations like this posted to the AzCCL ScribD page, which enables the embedded version below:

Helping to achieve The Arizona We Want

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The Arizona We Want, from the Center for the Future of Arizona

A primary conclusion of The Arizona We Want was, "Arizona needs fully prepared leadership and governance structures appropriate to the 21st century."

The Center for the Future of Arizona’s publication last fall of The Arizona We Want provided compelling data on our state that helped to instigate development of the Arizona Center for Civic Leadership.

In 2009, the CFA commissioned a Gallup Poll to obtain Arizonans’ perspective on the issues facing the state, with an objective of creating a residents’ agenda for moving Arizona forward.  The results of that survey reflect the importance of strong leadership to Arizona’s future. The report delineated five issues that require resolution, citing as issue number one:

“Arizona needs fully prepared leadership and governance structures appropriate to the 21st century.”

Subsequent to the report’s publication, the Flinn Foundation asked Battelle to inventory Arizona’s assets in the area of civic-leadership development. Battelle found that while very high-quality leadership-training organizations existed at the local and regional level, no entity existed to improve civic leadership statewide.

To fill the gap, the Flinn Foundation and theThomas R. Brown Foundations formed a partnership to create the Arizona Center for Civic Leadership.