Ward 1 Meridian City Councilman George Thomas was named a 2017 Leadership Fellow for the National League of Cities.

The principal mission of the Leadership Fellow Committee is to support the League in its efforts to promote excellence and innovation in the arena of local government, leadership development and local government leadership education.

Thomas is scheduled to attend the next National League of Cities spring meeting March 11-15 in Washington, D.C. The organization meets twice per year, including once in the fall. Thomas has served on the Meridian City Council since 1985.

“There are about 21 of us on the Leadership Fellow Committee,” Thomas said. “We set up leadership training opportunities for people and online courses, like budgeting and ethics. The topic this year in Washington for newly elected government personnel is to teach them their duties and what and what not to do. It’s a wide array of training sessions.”

Leadership Fellows serve one-year terms. This is the third time Thomas has been selected to the committee. He is also serving on the Community and Economic Development federal advocacy Committee.

In the Leadership Summit, we work with a specific topic once per year. The topic last year was Technology in Government,” Thomas said. “We went to the Google offices. Topics up for discussion might be how cities are dealing with driverless cars,  Email and Social Media.”

Thomas said the conferences are especially beneficial to those who had no previous governmental experience before they were elected.

“A lot of people who are elected to government office have no background in government. I came from education into local government,” Thomas said. “When I got in government, I knew there was a budget, but I didn’t know there was a budget for the water department and a budget for Parks and Recreation. It’s those kinds of things we provide education for. There are forums on public speaking and even forums on how to deal with the media.”

Thomas said NLC membership has been beneficial.

“It’s been fun, but the biggest thing I get out of NLC is meeting people from other cities and learn how they deal with problems and opportunities,” Thomas said. We talk about services and grants, so that is good, too.”

The City of Meridian has been a member of the NLC for 30 years. Thomas said he has attended most of the meetings.

“It’s always something new at these meetings,” Thomas said. “At this meeting coming up, we will have different speakers, including speakers who will represent the new Trump Administration.”