Casa Grande, small city but huge experience

One of the reasons I was drawn to Casa Grande and the opportunity to intern there is the ability to be involved in upper management issues and projects. I have yet to be disappointed and have been part of very unique projects. My experience began with working in the police department. Over the course of several months I would work on a wide variety of projects with many of the city’s departments. I have helped to developed performance measures for the city departments, I’ve developed new operation policies for the police department, I’ve performed a sales tax audit that identified business that perhaps should be paying sales taxes or lack a business licenses, and a variety of other projects.

However, I would have to say the experience can be captured in the last week or two. Last week the other two management analysts were in meeting with the City Manager and Deputy City Manager and discussed the upcoming council retreat for the budget. The meeting went for a little over an hour and there were various topics discussed. The other day I also sat in on a budget meeting with the City Manager, Deputy City Manager, Finance Director, Budget Analyst and my two management analysts colleagues.

The point I want to make is that I’m not sitting in on lower level meetings nor am I just sitting in on them to watch and observe. Rather I am part of the discussion of the meetings and providing my input and research I’ve collected. In a large organization this would be almost unheard of. Interns are not typically utilized to this degree but I have proven my abilities and gained the confidence and respect of my peers and the city’s management. As I near the end of my internship with Casa Grande I do so having gained a great deal of knowledge but also skills in interacting with people at different levels of management and in different departments. If you are not aware you can easily be enveloped by the internal politics found in every organization. Casa Grande is a small city compared to the large cities in Phoenix and Tucson, but working in a small city has providing a greater level of exposure to all facets of local government.