CCMF Announces 2016 Scholarship Competition Winners

The California City Management Foundation (CCMF) recently announced the winners of its sixth annual Scholarship competition:

  • Will Provost – Wes McClure Scholarship winner ($1,500)
  • Natalie Hernandez – Mark Curran Scholarship winner ($1,500)

Will Provost is currently pursuing his MPA at the USC Sol Price School while working part-time as a Data Analyst for the City of Glendale’s City Manager’s Office. He was also recently selected to serve as the 2016-17 Co-Chair of the ICMA Student Chapter at USC. As a future City Manager, he envisions leveraging his background in economics “as a framework to address the social and environmental problems of our time.”

Natalie Hernandez is a 2013 grad of Loyola Marymount and a current Project Assistant for the Institute of Local Government (ILG) in Sacramento. She will attend the USC Sol Price School’s Master of Planning Program from 2016-18 “to build research skills and create place-based solutions for environmental and social equity.”

Wes McClure, for whom the CCMF scholarship was named, worked as city manager of San Leandro for 28 years. He passed away at the age of 94 on December 20, 2009. Wes had many outstanding attributes, including an unparalleled ability to listen. His patience and skill in this regard contributed enormously to his successful career working with city councils and impacted CCMF directly during the formation of the foundation, in which Wes played an integral part. The award was created in honor of Wes’s outstanding and significant contributions to the City Managers’ Department, League of California Cities, the State of California, and the city management profession.

CCMF was able to award a second $1,500 scholarship this year thanks to a donation from Mike Busch of Urban Futures, who donated in memory of Mark Curran. CCMF named this award the “Mark Curran Scholarship” in his honor.

“I have been wanting to donate funds to a non-profit in Mark Curran’s honor. Considering he was a founding member of CCMF–an organization I supported as a Deputy City Manager and I now support as a Corporate Sponsor–it seems fitting,” said Busch. “Today as the owner of Urban Futures, I continue my pursuit of helping public agencies perform better and I credit my professional and personal growth to CCMF’s New & Future City Managers Workshop and the mentoring from several city managers. I run my business like a city manager because of my training and mentoring.”

“We are proud to present these scholarship awards to Natalie and Will this year. They are both excellent examples of the budding next generation of local government leaders: smart, creative and ambitious,” said CCMF President Wade McKinney. “And our special thanks go out to Mike Busch for honoring Mark Curran in such a meaningful and impactful way.”