Meet our 2022 Board
Laura Baker - PRESIDENT
Laura is the Head of Smart City and Innovation at the City of Casey, one of Australia’s fastest growing Councils. At the City of Casey, Laura drives a future focused agenda to embed smart technology, collaboration and innovation in Council and community to increase sustainability and resilience in the local region.
The Smart City and Innovation team drives employee innovation capability programs, delivers smart city projects, builds strategic partnerships, and engages with the community to collectively solve challenges.
Laura’s experience spans across Corporate, Not For Profit and Government. She is passionate about creating social and environmental value through emerging business and policy models and has researched this topic in a range of countries spanning Asia, Europe and USA.
Laura is passionate about rural economic and community development and is an active member as the President of the Euroa Community Action Group.
Adam Mowlam - VICE PRESIDENT
Dr Adam Mowlam is the Digital Twin Strategic Lead at the Department of Environment, Land, Water & Planning (DELWP) within the Victorian Government. Adam holds a PhD in Space Geodesy and a double degree in Geomatic Engineering and Information Systems from the University of Melbourne.
He is an experienced public servant having more than 20 years' experience across the spatial sciences and is the former President of the Australian Smart Communities Association (ASCA), and is also a member of Standards Australia IT-268 Sustainable Cities and Communities Committee, the NSW Smart Places Advisory Council and the SSSI Spatial Digital Twin Special Interest Group (SDT-SIG). Adam is currently focused on a range of data-driven, digital innovation projects including the formation of a government-led digital twin roadmap.
Dr Mowlam is a passionate public sector leader committed to cross-organisational collaboration and the delivery of digital solutions that improve liveability outcomes and attract investment to build our growing tech economy. He previously led the Wyndham City Smart City Office where he developed and embedded an exciting vision that led one of Australia’s fastest and largest municipalities to the forefront in the Smart City space and put them on the map both nationally and internationally as a leader in the local government sector.
Jodie Dutton - secretary
Jodie is an Employment Facilitator delivering the Local Jobs Program for the Department of Education Skills and Employment in Western Australia. Prior to this, Jodie was the Analytics Lead at the City of Joondalup focused on the use of data to optimise organisational performance and service delivery outcomes for the community. Jodie's experience spans across State and Local governments and the healthcare sector and she is an advocate of Communities of Practice where learnings can be shared to accelerate innovation and outcomes.
Jodie is driven to help organisations uncover their stories through the use of data and analytics, embedding data governance and increasing digital literacy in our communities.
Luke Musgrave- treasurer
Luke is the Director of the Smart Places Acceleration Program at the NSW Department of Planning and Environment. He holds a Bachelor of Commerce (Finance), Master of Planning, and an Executive Master of Public Administration.
Luke’s team is leading the development of smart places in NSW to embed smart thinking into the planning for places in urban and regional areas by helping place owners – including councils, government agencies, property owners, and regional organisations – apply innovative smart technologies and capabilities.
Luke is passionate about his role as a leader in the public service with a strong focus on collaboration, empowerment and leading with empathy. He has a diverse background with experience in state and local government as well as roles in the banking and finance sector. He has spent the last 10 years working in the NSW public service where he led the development and implementation of strategic land use plans for the Illawarra-Shoalhaven and the South East & Tablelands as well as facilitated the finalisation of high value planning proposals in Greater Sydney and throughout Southern NSW.
James Sankar
James is the chair of the Standards Australia IT-269 committee responsible for IEC Electrotechnical and Electrotechnology Smart City Systems. He has more than two decades of experience successfully leading service transformations in the UK, Europe and Australia. Examples include a secure guest Wi-Fi global service (eduroam), unified collaboration platforms, collaborative storage, cyber security and professional services.
In 2020, he founded Smart Footprints a carbon neutral consulting, advisory and managed services company bringing together Internet and Data expertise and applying this to Smart Sustainable Cities. The aim being to develop and adopt “smart” standards that can meaningfully progress a much needed transition in the way we work, rest and play in a sustainable way.
He is an active volunteer with interests in extending smart city practices to be inclusive especially to support the vulnerable such as the poor, homeless and refugees and in the use of technology and systems to accelerate the recovery of our natural environment for all living creatures for future generations.
Bruce Marshall
Bruce is the Coordinator Economic Development and Smart Cities at Maribyrnong City Council in Melbourne's Inner West. Amongst other things, his team has responsibility for driving the municipality's Smart City program and in the process delivering on the vision of the Smart City Strategic Framework.
Over his 11 years working in the Local Government sector prior to Maribyrnong, Bruce has had a number of roles relating to Economic Development, Investment Attraction, Place Making and Visitor Economy promotion. Whilst he is relatively new to the Smart Cities space, he is passionate about exploring how Smart City initiatives can play an active role in place making, place activation and improving the convenience and quality of life for residents.
Prior to Local Government he ran a small business in the international tourism sector, and has a particularly strong connection with Japan, having previously lived and worked there for nearly 4 years.
Georgie Johnson
Georgie is a passionate, innovative, strategic thinker. As a problem-solving change advocate, Georgie’s experience in local government has seen her focus on strategy development, project, program and event management for over 10 years. This along with her non-profit experience often sees her thought process to be outside the box.
Georgie believes in and values innovation and equality, always seeking opportunities to influence and create a positive impact. Originally from New Zealand, Georgie thinks and plans globally, looking for ways to solve community-based problems. She believes we are all responsible for building a better world for generations current and future.
People are the key driver to a smart world, smart cities and communities with technology and data enabling key outcomes. With people as the focus, we all can take steps to transform the world we live in.
Nathaniel Mason
Nathaniel joined Local Government from an IT career foundation in systems integration and IT consulting. In IT Solutions at the City of Tea Tree Gully, Nathaniel and the Business Solutions team are responsible for IT projects, strategy and information management. Their aim is to orchestrate the chaos of technology and business into effective strategies, projects and collaborative outcomes for Local Government professionals and communities. Over the past couple of years, this has included deployment of Things Network gateways and integration of IoT solutions. Nathaniel is secretary of Local Government Information Technology Association of South Australia, and has been a Civic Innovation Task Force team member with the Smart Cities Council of Australia and New Zealand.
