Just under seven days and counting to the newest edition of the annual International City/County Management Association conference in sunny Phoenix, Arizona! This ICMA sponsored event, convening nearly 2,500 leaders, hundreds of speakers and an expo center full of solutions for every innovative town out there; we sure hope your community is sending a delegation.

In preparation, we have a few important notes to pass along. Links to the official schedule, a few presentations that we are excited about, our booth number (including prizes and raffles), and contact information for our representatives too.

This is a packed event with many different programs and events running simultaneously throughout the conference. A detailed day-by-day calendar available here: http://webapps.icma.org/conference2012/?u=schedule.cfm

These are a few of the many presentations that look particularly interesting:

12-2:45pm Sunday

• Real Solutions for Real Communities: Evidence-Based Recommendations for Budgeting, Organizational Culture, Planning and Citizen Engagement
• Convention Center Room North 120A

9:45-11am Monday

• Managing Your Council-Manager Relationship
• Convention Center Room North 224AB

Also 9:45-11am Monday

• Growing Your Economy: Economic Development Strategies for Small Communities
• Convention Center Room North 122A-C

12:45-2pm Monday

• Creating Vision, Not Division: What’s Important to the Community
• Convention Center Room North 229AB

2:30-3:40pm Monday

• Identifying Opportunities for Change
• Convention Center Room North 122A-C

9:45-10:45pm Tuesday

• Economic Development Master Planning
• Convention Center Exhibit Hall 5/6, Theater A

11-12pm Tuesday

• Great by Choice Break-Out
• Convention Center Room North 120A

8:15-10:15am Wednesday Morning

• Reinventing Local and Regional Economies
• Convention Center Room North 120D

The ClearPoint Strategy team will be in attendance Sunday through late Wednesday afternoon, showing our web-based software’s latest and greatest strategic planning, performance management, and project tracking features.

Official expo center hours are as follows:
Sunday: 5-7pm
Monday: 9:30-4pm
Tuesday: 9:30-2pm.

Our team will be located in booth #133. A nice map of all the vendors and directions around the conference center are available online. You can even add us to your official “Expo Plan” by clicking the link below: http://s36.a2zinc.net/clients/icma2012/icma2012/public/Booth.aspx?IndexInList=13&FromPage=ExhibitorList.aspx&ParentBoothID=&ListByBooth=true&BoothID=104600

We have 500 (yes five-HUNDRED) thumb drives to give away to everyone who visits us! We will also be raffling away a fancy flat-screen monitor to one lucky guest. Be sure to drop your business card in the jar to be included in the drawing.

Representatives from other high-performing communities including Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Durham, North Carolina, Charlottesville, Virginia and many others who are using ClearPoint may stop by the booth as well.

Be sure to follow us on twitter @AscendantSMG for the latest whereabouts of our team.