2025 State & Local Virtual Conference

*SCHEDULE OF EVENTS

(*Schedule is Subject to Change)

Registration Rates (Online registration will close on February 25)

• AFERM Members: $20
• AFERM Non-Members: $100

This one day virtual conference is intended for folks in State & Local Government that already have, or are looking to start an ERM program in their organization. Topics include:

• ERM Early Adopters & Stories: Cities, Counties, States, Higher Ed. – Sponsored by Origami Risk
• ERM Governance
• ERM Finance & Audit – Sponsored by EMY
• ERM Resiliency in Critical Infrastructure
• ERM Cybersecurity & Privacy – Sponsored by Crowe LLP
• ERM: A One-Bite Approach

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Speaker Bios:

Dr. Karen Hardy, AFERM President
Dr. Karen Hardy is the Principal and Chief Risk Officer of Strategic Leadership Advisors LLC and a 2023 inducted Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration (NAPA). She is an adjunct faculty of the GMU School of Business CRO Program. As the former deputy CRO at the US Department of Commerce and ERM leader at the National Institutes of Health, during her federal career, Dr. Hardy has collectively led the development of ERM practices across 39 public organizations. At Commerce, a multi-billion dollar cabinet-level agency, she designed and led ERM across 12 bureaus from the ground up, impacting 47,000 employees. Her program and operation were cited by GAO as a leading practice across government, which included NOAA, recipient of the AFERM Luminary Award.

Dr. Hardy served as the first Senior Advisor for Risk Management Policy at OMB, working side-by-side with the Deputy Director for Management and U.S. Controller in establishing ERM policy across the federal government. She is the original contributing author of ERM language in OMB A-11 and the revised July 2016 OMB Circular A 123. Dr. Hardy authored the first research paper on the subject of ERM in government for the IBM Center for the Business of Government in 2010. In 2015-2017, she was selected to serve as a member of the PwC COSO ERM Advisory Board. In 2014, she received the Most Promising New Textbook Award for her book “Enterprise Risk Management: A Guide for Government Professionals.

As a founding Board Vice President of the Association of Federal Enterprise Risk Management, Dr. Hardy received the Risk Management Hall of Fame Award in 2017. She continues to serve as a senior advisor for numerous agencies, boards, and NGOs, nationally and internationally. Dr. Hardy is a graduate of the Federal Executive Institute and recipient of two Bronze Medal Awards and holds a doctorate in Organizational Leadership and Human Resource Development.

Paige Smith, Chief Compliance and Risk Officer, Universities of Wisconsin Administration
Paige Smith serves as the Chief Compliance and Risk Officer in the Office of Compliance and Risk Management at the Universities of Wisconsin Administration, a higher education public entity serving more than 164,000 students.

In her current role, Paige leads the Office of Compliance and Integrity and the Office of Risk Management. She oversees general compliance areas (e.g. Title IX, Clery Act, Ethics and Integrity, Public Records, Youth Protection and State Authorization) as well as risk management functions (e.g. Administers the state’s self-funded insurance program, manages insurance policies, liability and workers’ compensation. In 2023, Paige and her team developed and implemented a new system-wide pilot program called the Risk-Compliance-Audit (“RCA”) Program, which serves as a modified version of an enterprise risk management program using a university-based focus.

Paige has served in various administrative roles within the UW System since 2010, with some form of risk management oversight, guidance or function, including Senior System Legal Counsel (UW System) and Vice Chancellor of Finance and Administration (UW-Platteville). Prior to joining UW System, Paige served as legal counsel for Southern Illinois University and City Attorney for the City of Carbondale, Illinois.

Leo Constantine, Sr. Vice President at Marsh Advisory
Leo Costantino has broad risk management experience in private and public sector organizations. Leo served as Risk Manager for the Los Angeles County Office of Education and the Los Angeles Community College District, and as the Risk Management Inspector General for the County of Los Angeles.

Leo’s public sector ERM experience includes serving on PRIMA’s first Enterprise Risk Management teaching faculty, and as an ERM consulting resource for the University of California Office of The President.

Leo’s current role is Sr. Vice President at Marsh Advisory, where he leads operational and ERM risk assessment, and also leads a team of Workers’ Compensation and Liability complex claims advocates.

Sean Catanese, Enterprise Risk Management Program Manager, King County Office of Risk Management Services
Sean Catanese has managed King County, Washington’s enterprise risk management program since 2014. King County is the nation’s 13th most populous county. King County government includes more than 16,000 employees serving 2.3 million residents with mass transit, public health, and criminal justice, among many other vital services.

Sean was recognized as the 2023 Public Risk Manager of the Year by the Public Risk Management Association (PRIMA). He also serves on PRIMA’s Enterprise Risk Management teaching faculty. He is a regular contributor to works developing the profile and understanding of ERM, with a specific focus on how public sector agencies can engage ERM to improve their performance and decision-making.

Prior to joining King County in 2014, Sean was an analyst and senior ERM consultant, serving a wide range of clients in public and private higher education, public safety, and municipal government, among others.

Ken Lewis, Senior Administrative & ERM Division Manager, Hennepin County, MN
Kendrick Lewis has worked for Hennepin County, the largest population county in Minnesota, for 25 years. He originated the ERM program eight years ago. He leads an executive risk committee made up of the Hennepin’s County Administrator, COO, CIO, CFO, County Attorney Civil Division Chief, Emergency Management Director, and Strategy Director. He also leads a committee of those managing risk as their day-to-day work including IT risk, insurance, compliance, internal audit, workers compensation and safety, and security. He has developed training and educates staff on risk management practices.

Ken leads an enterprise-wide strategic risk identification, assessment, mitigation, response, and monitoring process. He is the Midwest Regional representative on the AFERM State and Local Outreach Committee and facilitates the AFERM State and Local At-Large Group. He enjoys conversations with others leading ERM in the public sector to help build a network of practitioners.

Doug Webster, ERM Consultant
The Honorable Doug Webster is a Principal with TFC Consulting. He is a retired Air Force officer with a subsequent quarter century both working in and consulting to the federal government. He has served as Director of Risk Management at USAID and Deputy Director of the DoD Business Transformation Agency. As a Senate-confirmed Presidential appointee, he has served as CFO of both the Department of Labor and the Department of Education.

He is pioneer in Enterprise Risk Management in the federal government, having introduced the topic to the White House in 2008, established the first federal interest group in ERM that same year, led the founding of the Association for Federal Enterprise Risk Management (AFERM) in 2011, and developed and taught the inaugural ERM course for George Washington University.

Dr. Webster has co-authored or co-edited four books, including Chasing Change: Building Organizational Capacity in a Turbulent Environment (2009), Managing Risk and Performance: A Guide for Government Decision Makers (2014), and Value Based Management in Government (2020). He is an elected Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration, and holds the RIMS-CRMP-FED certification.

Grace Crickette, Vice President for Finance and Administration, CFO and Treasurer, University of Redlands, CA
Passionate about creating innovative programs that elevate the reputation of the organization, provide a positive employee experience, and result in lasting change and sustainable savings. An accomplished Administrator and Financial Executive, Chief Risk Officer, and Chief Compliance Officer, with an exceptional record of success in leading institutional strategic business planning, finance and budgeting, administration and operations management, investment and business growth, and governance and risk management for the 3 of the top ranked Public Universities and Health Systems.

Grace was chosen in 2011 as one of Business Insurance’s Women to Watch. Grace was also selected by Business Insurance magazine for their 2011 Risk Management Honor Roll. Also in 2011, Treasury and Risk magazine named Grace as one of the “100 Most Influential People in Finance”, and she was recipient of the West & North America Awards in 2011 and the Information Security Executive (ISE) of the Decade Award in 2012. In 2017, PHI Protection Network (PPN) recognized her for her dedication to protecting health information awarding her the PHI Hero’s Award.

Grace currently serves on the ISACA CGEIT Certification Working Group and is Chair of the Information Technology Security Community for ASIS International.

Grace is an alum of the University of Redlands, Harvard Business School, and Harvard Graduate School.

Bradley Grams, Regional Environmental Protection Specialist, Planning and Programming Branch, Airports Division, Great Lakes Region, U.S. Federal Aviation Administration
Bradley (Brad) Grams is focused on cross-governmental environmental, social, and governance (ESG) and Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) policy development within the infrastructure space, with a career crossing the U.S. Departments of Energy and Transportation, and the Environmental Protection Agency. Brad currently is a Regional Environmental Protection Manager in the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration’s Great Lakes Region, where they are responsible for climate, energy, environment, sustainability, and ESG and ERM solutions for airports and their partners. Prior to their current role, they were the Acting Director of Planning at the Environmental Protection Agency, leading the Agency’s strategy, ERM, and evidence and evaluation units. They also held other senior roles at the Agency, including Principal White House Liaison for Environmental Protection Budgeting, and Chief of Staff for Chemical and Waste Risk Management under the inter-governmental Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI). Prior to the EPA, they worked at the Department of Energy, leading a team focused on ambient air monitoring in Chicagoland.

Outside of their government work, Brad is an Adjunct Lecturer at Northwestern University, teaching on strategy, ESG, ERM, and program evaluation methods, and co-leads the institution’s Affinity Leaders and Learners Mentoring Program. They also mentor students pursuing climate, environmental, energy, sustainability, and policy careers at the Clean Energy Leadership Institute, where he was a 2021 Fellow, and The University of Chicago, Princeton University, Harvard University, and Yale University. They hold degrees in Chemistry (B.Sc.) and Environmental Studies (B.A.), both from the University of Chicago (2005), a Master of Public Policy and Administration (MPPA) degree from Northwestern University (2017), and certificates in executive leadership for sustainability (2021/2022) and equitable clean energy development and finance (2023 and 2024) from Harvard University and Yale University, respectively.

Mel Thomson, Risk Manager, Valley Metro
Mel Thomson recently joined Valley Metro to establish the risk management program. This involves developing traditional risk as well as enterprise risk management. She is working closely the Board of Directors who comprise of nineteen cities to establish their risk appetite, tolerances, frameworks, and risk process to identify, assess, mitigate, and prioritize cross-cutting risks. In addition, she is linking strategic planning with the enterprise’s portfolio view of risks and traditional risk’s total cost of risk (TCOR) to provide better tools for risk informed decision-making. Staff and cross functional teams are engaged and collaborate in the process to mitigate threats and to capture opportunities for risk optimization.

Mel began in the benefits consulting arena and later transitioned into property and casualty at the State of Arizona’s Department of Administration in the Risk Management Division. She was the Risk Administrator for the City of Maricopa where she designed and implement a new risk division. Currently, Mel serves at the City of Phoenix’s Risk Management Division in the Finance Department.

Mel is the Education Chair for Arizona Public Risk Management Association’s Board (AZPRIMA). She also chairs the first State & Local Outreach Committee for the Association of Federal Enterprise Risk Management (AFERM). Mel received the Volunteer of the Year in 2023 from AFERM and was the scholarship recipient of the Chief Risk Officer Program from AFERM through George Mason University. Mel received the City of Phoenix’s Employee Excellence Award for Innovation introducing Enterprise Risk Management to city departments.

Mel started the ERM Book Club through AFERM which stemmed from desire to share incredible ERM information with other risk professionals under a casual self-study environment reading the book, Enterprise Risk Management: Todays Leading Research for Tomorrow’s Executive by John Frasier, Rob Quail, and Betty Simkins. Well over 150 readers have signed up from state, local, federal programs as well as guest authors occasionally attend the book club to contribute and share their insight about the chapter they wrote in the book with the readers.

She has a Master’s in Administration from Northern Arizona University, Associate in Risk Management (ARM), and is an Enterprise Risk Management Certified Professional (ERMCP). She serves on the Advisory Council for Northern Arizona University’s Risk Management Insurance Certificate Program through the W.A. Franke College of Business. Mel is working on her Master’s Certificate in Enterprise Risk Management and Governance from York University Schulich School of Business in Ontario, Canada. She is also working on her Certified Risk Management Professional (CRMP-FED) designation from RIMS.

Joe Minadeo, Water Service Department Process Control Division Manager, City of Phoenix
Joe’s team is responsible for delivering 1.7 million Phoenix residents’ clean water through city’s critical infrastructure systems. Utilizing Enterprise Risk Management’s framework (ISO31000) Joe has been able to provide leadership risk-based decisions to meet the department’s number one objective. He has also aligned risk to NIST’s Cyber Security and Privacy Frameworks, CISA’s Cross-Sector Cybersecurity Performance Goals (CPG’s), and most importantly through ISA/IEC 62443 Standards. Mapping these standards has provided continual support and success aligning risk through strategy at the executive levels including properly protecting the cities most valuable resource and infrastructure.

Dr. David H. Tobey, Ph.D., Executive Director and Principal Investigator National CyberWatch Center
Dr. David H. Tobey is the Principal Investigator and Executive Director of the CyberWatch Center, a national consortium of over 500 colleges and universities supported by the National Science Foundation, headquartered at Prince George’s Community College. Dr. Tobey’s research applies the latest advances in neuroscience to understand, assess, and improve readiness to learn, become certified, and advance throughout a professional career. His research discovered the neural foundations of expert performance—the brain’s equivalent to a software applet that Dr. Tobey labeled a thinkLet. The formation of thinkLets is detected by the psychometric technique, Potential Performance Analysis.™ PPA can accurately diagnose the current level and future potential of proficiency, competency, and mastery development and identify the most appropriate interventions to reach maximum potential.

Dr. Tobey is also a serial entrepreneur. He has led or assisted with developing regional, national, and international translational research centers. The businesses he founded were listed by Inc. Magazine among the fastest-growing companies in the United States, set international industry standards, and became publicly traded corporations through mergers or Initial Public Offering (IPO). Dr. Tobey has served as a consultant, executive officer, or board member for private and public companies in the distribution, financial services, hospitality, information technology, life sciences, publishing, and transportation industries.

Robert Clark, Jr., Chief Audit and Compliance Officer, Howard University
Rob Clark, Jr. is currently the Chief Audit and Compliance Officer at Howard University. He’s got over 37 years of Audit, Compliance, and ERM leadership. Which just means for over half of his life, he has eaten lunch alone. Cuz, let’s face it, nobody wants to hang out with the audit and compliance guy! But he does have over 3 decades of proven strategies of communicating with and getting support from the executive leadership.

He’s got a bunch of professional certifications … which, frankly, nobody really cares about. All we know is he’s a certified nerd.

He’s also a global keynote speaker and President-Elect of the National Speakers Association in Washington DC. [Oh, and he’s also a DJ.] Get ready to get your GEEK on with practical strategies you’ll be able to apply.

Cathie Chancellor, Risk Manager, City of Norfolk, VA
Cathie T. Chancellor, JD, MS, CRM has served as Risk Manager of the City of Norfolk, Virginia since 2019, following a combined 15+years of prior public entity service in that role at Cleveland State University, Ohio University (Athens), and Cuyahoga County, Ohio’s largest county, where she also served as an Assistant Prosecuting Attorney. Her current responsibilities include leading the Finance/Risk Management Division in handling commercial and self-insurance programs; having supervisory oversight of pre-defense small casualty claims; serving in a consultative role regarding risk exposure/transfer management; forwarding collaborative efforts with key stakeholders to implement a strategic Enterprise Risk Management program designed to educate employees and support safety and loss mitigation initiatives; and coordinating FEMA disaster recovery efforts on behalf of the City.

After identifying trends impacting the City and implementing “Risk Management Day”, a virtual training initiative designed to enhance programs, highlight resources, and engage one-on-one conversations with risk owners and stakeholders Ms. Chancellor was ultimately named 2023 Risk Manager of the Year by the Virginia Chapter of the Public Risk and Insurance Management Association (Va-PRIMA) for implementing the ERM-based program, following receipt of recognition by national PRIMA for the program, which resulted in the City’s successful attainment of the 2023 Outstanding Achievement for a Public Entity Risk Program Award. She was invited to join AFERM’s inaugural State and Local Government Outreach Committee to further unite goals of increasing awareness and educating public entities across vertical sectors about the relevance and effectiveness of ERM.

Cathie has presented and co-presented with colleagues concerning several risk management topics at numerous PRIMA and URMIA conferences; briefly served as OH-PRIMA, (Ohio) Chapter President; and authored various University Risk Management and Insurance Association (URMIA) articles for membership education newsletters. Cathie is currently a member of the national PRIMA Board of Directors; holds juris doctor and master’s degrees in law and urban/Government studies, respectively; and is a charter member graduate of the Case Western Reserve University Weatherhead School of Business Management’s Society of Professional Fellows; she was confirmed by the National Alliance of Insurance Education and Research – Certified Risk Managers International as the first JD/CRM in the State of Ohio (1993).

Alex Souto, Deputy City Manager, City of Pasadena
Alex is the Deputy City Manager for Risk Management with the City of Pasadena, CA. In this capacity, he is responsible for implementing, integrating, maturing, and evaluating Enterprise Risk Management through the application of iterative risk assessment and treatment processes and promotion of a culture of risk aware decision making. Alex also manages the City’s traditional risk management functions of liability claims management, insurance, occupational safety, and workers’ compensation as well as the City’s ADA accessibility program. Prior to moving into Risk Management, Alex specialized in Human Resources where he oversaw the City of Pasadena’s labor and employee relations divisions, managing personnel investigations, regulatory compliance, the negotiation and administration of the City’s collective bargaining contracts, and the City-wide occupational health and safety program.

Alex holds a Bachelor’s in Political Science from Cal State Los Angeles and a Master’s in Public Administration from Cal State Northridge. He also has a Master Certification in Labor Relations from the California Public Employers Labor Relations Association. Prior to joining the City of Pasadena in 2015, Mr. Souto held positions in Human Resources at several other public agencies in Southern California.