CITY OF POMONA
COUNCIL REPORT
June 6, 2022
To: Honorable Mayor and Members of the City Council
From: James Makshanoff, City Manager
Submitted By: Anita D. Gutierrez, Development Services Director SUBJECT: SUMMARY REPORT ON STAFF’S PARTICIPATION IN A GRADUATE CERTIFICATE PROGRAM FOR CURRENT & EMERGING MUNICIPAL LEADERS DEVELOPED & PROVIDED BY THE LINCOLN INSTITUTE OF LAND POLICY & CLAREMONT LINCOLN UNIVERSITY RECOMMENDATION:
It is recommended that the City Council receive and file the Summary Report on Staff’s Participation in a Graduate Certificate Program for Current & Emerging Municipal Leaders, Developed & Provided by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy & Claremont Lincoln University.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:
This report provides a summary of the City’s participation in a pilot graduate certificate program for municipal organizations. Six City staff participated in the program and earned an Advanced Practice Graduate Certificate in Innovations and Trends in Public Administration.
FISCAL IMPACT:
The program cost was $3,200 per person all-inclusive for prototype teams and provided for a nine-credit advanced practice graduate certificate from Claremont Lincoln University (a non-profit, accredited, graduate institution). The total cost to the City was $22,400, which was paid out of FY 2021-22 General Fund Budget.
DISCUSSION:
In September of 2021, the City entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy and Claremont Lincoln University to provide City of Pomona employees, vendors, or associates a team-based opportunity to engage in a program of combined offerings of the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy and Claremont Lincoln University. Claremont Lincoln University is a non-profit, accredited university focused on positive social change in the public and non-profit sector. The Lincoln Institute brings 75 years of professional practice, research, and expertise in addressing social, economic, environmental, and financial challenges in public administration at all levels.
This novel program, designed specifically for municipalities to address complex challenges in their communities through a unique graduate program for current and emerging leaders. The program focused on teams identifying and addressing municipal projects, issues, and strategies that benefit the city. The program allowed team members to participate in professional development, as well as to complete an advanced practice graduate certificate from an accredited, non-profit university.
Program Elements:
Story Map of the Municipal History. Using the ESRI database, staff worked with the Lincoln Institute’s Center for GeoSpatial Solutions to develop, study, and identify key areas of issue in the story map that address systemic disinvestment and structural disparities a story map that depicts the history of the municipality.
Webinar series. Open to all constituents of the municipality, as well as the team, three webinars were held to provide the context and rationale—the truth in data—for identifying structural racism and disparities, for telling the story to build community engagement and will to change, and for defining plans, policies, actions, and funding streams to implement that change.
Advanced Practice Graduate Certificate: Innovations and Trends in Public Administration. This three-course, nine-credit master’s certificate supports the team in taking the learning from the webinars and the story map review to application and implementation. As a cohort and as a team, the participants worked collaboratively and individually on the defined initiatives as the primary component of the curricula. Each of the courses extended and deepened the team’s capacity to define, design, scenario plan, fund, and implement the intended change. Further, the team explored key aspects of new and needed forms of leadership to engage the community and execute the change. Courses were eight weeks in length and fully online, allowing teams to bring the peer learning in person as appropriate for each municipality.
Lincoln Institute and CLU Network and Support. Throughout the program and beyond, participants have access to the network, research, and library of practices of the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy.
ArcGIS Story Map:
The Story Map created (link below), explores the foundational land use practices and decisions that paved the way for systemic inequities in development patterns, some of which can still be seen in Pomona today. Through maps we analyze visual evidence of how federal redlining and freeway development carved structural racism and environmental injustices into our community.
In order to address these inequities and bring forward meaningful, transformative policies for change, it is critical to understand how these imbedded discriminatory policies created conditions for inequity and their lasting impacts on the community. The Certificate program provided staff with some of the beginning tools to see problems and issues from different perspectives, which is a central component in understanding systemic inequities and creating transformative change.
Link to Story Map: https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/c5b6b05808014b5a9e24cf82b2a4dd1b Courses:
A total of six staff members participated from five different Departments along with one representative from the Fairplex. The program lasted eight months and was comprised of three courses. Those enrolled in the program were divided into two municipal cohorts and were required to complete a majority of the coursework as a group, facilitating understanding and coordination across departments. The following is a summary of what was learned in each course, the key tools developed by staff through this program, and potential next steps.
Urban Sustainability
Course Number MPA 5305-02
The “Urban Sustainability” course curriculum included theories and case studies examining the impact on the historical development of cities in the United States and what can be done moving forward to create sustainable cities in the face of a rapidly changing political, social, economic, and environmental climate. The course provided weekly topics such as the identification of city’s taxonomy, principles of urban sustainability principles, regional and global sustainability initiatives, introduction to scenario planning types, and stakeholder identification tools. The cohorts applied these topics to their respective city and were able to identify the key driving forces behind their city’s development, local/state/national policies affecting the future of the city, an expanded stakeholder list, and potential tools to implement in order to address the needs of their city. As part of the final course assignment, cohorts drew from their collective professional knowledge, course materials and drafted a clear and concise plan addressing sustainability challenges at both the local and regional scale.
Building Networks and Coalition Building
Course Number MPA 5307-01
The “Building Networks and Coalition Building” curriculum included instruction and assignments to promote professional agency and governance skills. The cohort was exposed to material that expanded perspectives regarding coalition building, governance frameworks, developing pathways for governance intervention, and facilitating public policies and services. Staff found the assignments regarding analyses of disparate pieces of governance frameworks and how they collaborate together, particularly applicable to City work. They discussed how the various Departments in the City work together to build coalitions with the public and other regional governance agencies. Introduction to the “Three Good Things” exercise supported a positive paradigm for public employees to stay focused on service to the community and address real-world issues. The final assignment for this class included a robust discussion of comparing methods of governance and the effect on they have on decision control, flexibility, and ultimate execution for goals. The course challenged the cohort to analyze how resilient one has to be in managing public expectations and engagement with critical stakeholders. A key learning takeaway was that being complacent and relying on antiquated processes or unnecessary bureaucracy may be detrimental to current public development governance and sustainability.
Scenario Planning for Public Administration
Course Number MPA 5311-01
The “Scenario Planning for Public Administration” curriculum focused on the different models of scenario planning and driving forces to inform decision-making, collaboration, and dialogue between government entities and the community. The course emphasized evaluating real-world issues in order to formulate critical and collective strategies among key and diverse stakeholders to foster successful solutions and reach an equitable future. Cohort members worked on several assignments that assessed the current political climate and city challenges, such as affordable housing, homelessness, infrastructure improvements, and coalition building, and explored the ways in which the models of scenario planning can be implemented to prepare the community for various circumstances, measure driving forces over time, and monitor policy and strategic impact.
For example, one assignment within the course focused on building a strategy for monitoring driving forces over the next 50 years, developing flexible policy options that are responsive to changes, and measuring performance metrics to determine impact of policy implementation. Teams were required to visualize the future with various perspectives to solidify the strategies and activities that will assist to monitor fiscal operations, increasing economic development, promoting housing opportunity and stability, establishing safe and clean neighborhoods and parks, and improving infrastructure. The key takeaway from the course assignment was that municipalities must commit to not only addressing the strains faced today on the city and its residents, but also plan for 50 years of larger impacts. In order for civic institutions to plan the next 50 years and create the best roadway forward, the City will need to work closely with stakeholders, create points of inclusive engagement with the community, set measurable goals and benchmarks, and continue to center the City’s unique strengths and opportunities for growth.
Key Tools:
To execute critical initiatives that serve the community the program provided staff with the following key tools through the ArcGIS Story Map, course readings, coursework, and discussion:
Historical context. Understanding the need for change by providing an analysis of Pomona’s history and the root causes of structural racism and inequities.
How to utilize geospatial technology to identify visual evidence of disparities at the local and regional scale.
How to identify local sustainability issues and design sustainable solutions, mobilize resources, and evaluate public policy solutions to address issues.
Illustrate collaborative approaches to public policy development and implementation. Understanding the importance of community collaboration for program delivery.
How to formulate and compare different scenario models to achieve community goals.
Next Steps:
Overall, Staff found the Graduate Certificate Program beneficial to their own personal growth and to the City organization as a whole. In particular, Staff found that the cross-departmental collaboration was invaluable in understanding different perspectives in approaching difficult problems, which led to a more robust, realistic and implementable policy solutions. Based on the feedback from those enrolled in the program, staff recommends that the City continue to partner with learning institutions to provide this type of professional development to staff. Additionally, staff recommends exploring the development of a cross departmental City Academy to further champion transformative change. Similar to the program, a cross departmental City Academy would continue to facilitate discussion between departments, which may be a key component in driving staff ability to advance coordination beyond task-based appointments. Through this type of academy we may establish cross departmental interconnection by providing a high-level understanding of each departments objective goals as well as on-going detailed efforts taking place within separate divisions of each department. This effort is also in alignment with the work the City has been doing with the Bloomberg Harvard City Leadership Initiative, which reinforces that collaboration and diversity of opinion are key to creating innovative, transformational change in organizations.
Prepared by:
Samantha Piedra
Homeless Programs Coordinator
Carlos Molina
Assistant Planner
Alina Barron
Associate Planner
_____________________________
Anita D. Gutierrez, AICP
Development Services Director
Lincoln Institute of Land Policy & Claremont Lincoln University Graduate Certificate Program