LGA - Municipal Intern Program

On Thursday, August 4, 2022, the Local Government Academy returned to the Engineer’s Society of Western Pennsylvania to celebrate the achievements of this year's interns from the Municipal Intern Program.

On Wednesday, July 13th 2022, the Class came together again for their second Development Day, held at the Allegheny County Sanitary Authority (ALCOSAN). After the interns updated the Class on their current project progress, Megan Turnbull, Esq., Weiss Burkardt Kramer LLC, spoke about the Ethics Act, Sunshine Law, and Open Records Act, as well as the role of the solicitor in municipal government. A game of Pictionary pitted two teams of interns against each other, and then it was time for the highlight of the day: the ALCOSAN tour.

This year’s Municipal Intern Program kicked off with a virtual orientation and weekly check-ins, but on Wednesday, June 15th, the 2022 MIP Class met up for the first time in person. We joined together in Carnegie Borough’s council chambers with Amie Courtney, Director of Human Resources at Cranberry Township, and Mayor John Burwell of Homestead Borough, for conversations about professional development, career paths, and what it means to be a public servant. The day concluded with a fierce trivia contest and a fiercer tiebreaker.

Did you know we're also looking for a summer intern?

Each year, the MIP Intern Coordinator collaborates with the Academy team to cultivate relationships and facilitate experiences that align with the Academy’s foundational mission to Promote Excellence in Local Government.

Maybe interested? Know someone who might be? Check out the full breakdown here: https://bit.ly/3v3GuZe

Alea Dorsey-Tyler, a Public Policy candidate at Carnegie Mellon University, led Bethel Park’s Document Management Systems project during the summer of 2021. Essentially, she led the charge in transforming the Borough office with a fully digitized filing system.

Stages of this project included tagging sticky notes to rows of filing cabinets, all of which were filled with municipal paper documents that Alea had to decide the future of: to digitize or to destroy. She also worked with each department, understanding their workflow to streamline and automate their document management. Those procedures were then codified in a series of resolutions that went to the municipal council.

Alea reflected on her internship this past summer and said, “But by far the most enriching part of this experience has been all of the people I’ve met and had the chance to work with.”

2021 Intern Nick Lane, a concluding senior at Indiana University of Pennsylvania with a major in Regional Planning and Community Development, a minor in GIS, was selected by Brentwood Borough to assist in a project to modernize the community’s document retention policy. Nick was tasked with determining which documents were to be transferred to their new borough building, and which were to be retained for digitization.

The second component of his internship involved working alongside borough officials to set up an ArcGIS platform that could be used as a Citizens Problem Report, which allows citizens to report non-emergency issues within the community without clogging municipal communication systems. The ability to spend months strengthening his GIS skills was the hallmark of his experience this summer.

“In all, this experience has helped me perfect my GIS skills for my future, and this internship has helped me gain a better understanding of how things operate within local government.”

In Hampton Township this past summer, Intern Rohan Lambore, a Graduate Certificate-Seeking student through the Harvard Extension School, studying Public Policy, Public Administration, and Social Justice, assisted with the adoption of the township’s Implementable Comprehensive Plan (ICP).

Rohan’s project was three-fold: verifying existing businesses in the community, obtaining funding for the implementation of the ICP, and formulating a directory for the community to track businesses. This process had him working with the 5-member elected council, the township's departmental heads, and even face-to-face with the residents.

“I would 101% recommend the MIP with LGA to any and every one that is remotely interested in local government. The MIP
provides grassroots, personal approaches to every aspect of administration, be it for a COG, Borough, or Township.”

Shortly after the 2021 MIP ended, Jackson Township took on Rohan as the new Assistant Township Manager, and we couldn’t be more excited for this next step in his future! Congratulations, Rohan!