Saturday Committee Meeting

The committee began its meeting on Saturday morning at the Taj Gateway Hotel, our base of operations for our stay in Bangalore. Everyone else had arrived Friday or earlier in Bangalore, so they were not suffering from the jetlag that I was trying to fight. Two sets of lost luggage, but otherwise everyone arrived safely.

Our meetings here Saturday and Sunday are based primarily on ICMA association issues. We spent Saturday reviewing progress on our workplan for the year. (PDF) A big discussion took place regarding where ICMA should be headed in our work outside the United States in cases where the work is not being funded by outside foreign assistance agencies like USAID. Committee members also expressed frustration that we are not getting the word out to ICMA members about the benefits of the association's work outside the US. We will likely talk more about this on Sunday.

Currently, much of ICMA International's work is being done with projects in Afghanistan, Iraq, Guatemala, Indonesia, Serbia, India, Ethiopia and Lebanon which are funded by grants from outside foreign assistance agencies. ICMA funded international programs focus on those offered through ICMA South Asia and ICMA Latinoamerica.