David Allen leads GTA’s Office of Information Security, which unifies information security responsibilities for the state’s IT enterprise, the Georgia Enterprise Technology Services (GETS) program, and GTA.
In 2020, David received the State Scoop 50 State Cybersecurity Leader of the Year Award and the Georgia Technology Authority Leadership Award.
David holds a Master of Project Management from DeVry University and is a 1995 graduate of North Georgia College. He earned a Master of Strategic Studies from the U.S. Army War College in 2019. In addition, David holds key management and cybersecurity certifications, including Project Management Professional (PMP), Certified Information Security Manager (CISM), GIAC Certified Enterprise Defender (GCED), and Certified Scrum Master (CSM).
David has held numerous IT positions over his 20+ year career at companies, such as BellSouth Telecommunications, Accenture, and Wayne Farms LLC.
Prior to joining GTA in 2019, COL(R) Allen served as the Chief Information Officer/G6 for the Georgia Army National Guard.

Pascael Beaudette is the Executive Director of Research and Business Intelligence at the Technical College System of Georgia (TCSG). TCSG oversees the state’s technical colleges, adult literacy programs, and a host of economic and workforce development programs. In her current role, Pascael works with TCSG’s research and business intelligence teams to ensure the agency produces high quality BI reporting and research that inform practice and policy.
Prior to joining TCSG in December 2018, Pascael was the Deputy Director of the Governor’s Office of Student Achievement (GOSA). She has also held various research roles at GOSA and the Missouri Department of Labor. She has a master’s degree in Political Science from Emory University and a bachelor’s degree in Political Science from Truman State University.

Bob Bennett is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Digital Government and the founder of B2 Civic Solutions, an international smart cities consultancy firm based in Parkville, Mo. From 2016 to 2019 he served in Mayor Sly James’ administration as the Chief Innovation Officer for the City of Kansas City, Mo. During his tenure, he oversaw the city’s smart city initiatives including a 54-block total digitalization pilot, strategy development for the city and P3-based expansion plans. Kansas City’s initiatives earned the city an Edison Award (Gold) for “Collective Disruption” and civic innovation in 2017, and Bob was named one of GovTech’s Top 25 Doers, Dreamers and Drivers in 2018. Before his role with the city, Bob completed a 25-year career in the U.S. Army which included service as a Strategist, a Battalion Commander and multiple combat tours.

Phil Bertolini is vice president of the Center for Digital Government, a national research and advisory institute on information technology policies and best practices in state and local government. Previously, he served as deputy county executive and CIO for Oakland County, Michigan. During his 31-year tenure, Phil built a world-class IT organization in the second-largest county in Michigan, just north of Detroit. As Oakland County CIO, he oversaw more than 150 employees serving over 1.2 million residents. In 2005, he was also promoted to deputy county executive, holding dual positions until his retirement. Phil’s efforts earned the county national attention, winning numerous awards for technology innovation and excellence. He was named Governing Magazine’s Public Official of the Year and Government Technology Magazine’s Top 25 Doers, Dreamers & Drivers. He was also honored by the President Obama White House as a Champion of Change.

Kanti Chalasani serves as the Division Director for the Georgia Data Analytics Center (GDAC) at the Office of Planning and Budget (OPB). With over 25 years of experience in IT and management, and hands-on data warehousing / analytics experience, she brings an abundance of knowledge. Prior to joining OPB, she worked for various state agencies in Georgia ranging from Senior Business Intelligence Architect for the P20 data warehouse at the Office of Student Achievement to Associate Director/Chief Data Architect at the University System of Georgia Board of Regents as well as Information Systems Manager at the Georgia Department of Education. Kanti started her career after receiving her Master’s in Computer Applications from Osmania University in India in 1995.

Alan is Executive Vice President of e.Republic and Publisher of Government Technology magazine and Techwire. In this role, Alan is involved in the annual production of dozens of events as well as the strategic direction for Governing, Government Technology, Emergency Management, the Center for Digital Government and the Center for Digital Education. Alan is also the senior executive that has overall charge of e.Republic’s research organization which includes, custom research, the Digital Government and Digital Education Navigator tool and the Content Studio (webinars and custom content).
Alan has been a guest lecturer at universities and a frequent speaker for key government and industry organizations. For over 35 years, Alan has worked with industry, education and government officials to help them better understand the importance and use of information technology. Alan received his Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration at California State University, Sacramento.

Nikhil J. Deshpande is Chief Digital Officer for the state of Georgia. He heads the Office of Digital Services (DSGa) under the Georgia Technology Authority.
Nikhil envisioned and led Georgia’s user-centric digital transition to an enterprise open source web publishing system, GovHub. Under his direction, Georgia became the first state in the United States to use enterprise Drupal and meet special needs of constituents with a range of disabilities affecting vision, hearing, motion, and cognition, making GovHub Section 508 and WCAG 2.0 AA compliant.
Nikhil strongly advocated and set the framework for the use of social media for Georgia, back when using social media for government was not common. He established a presence for the state on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter to quickly address citizens’ questions and concerns.
Prior to his career in digital government, Nikhil worked in advertising and digital media.
Nikhil has two master’s degrees in Visual Communications and Interaction Design from the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay (IITB) and the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD). He served as adjunct faculty at the Atlanta campus of SCAD for 10 years, where he taught graduate classes in Interaction Design and User Experience.
Nikhil has won several national and international awards and recognition for his work in digital government. He was recently honored with Atlanta’s 40 under 40, an award recognizing 40 accomplished individuals under the age of 40.

Building on his former role as enterprise architect for the state of Iowa, Chris Dilley serves as a trusted advisor to state leaders. He has helped numerous states modernize systems, migrate to the cloud, automate workflows and deliver impactful services. Chris is a proud native Iowan, actively involved in the Boys & Girls Club and coaches youth judo.

Amber D’Ottavio is the Vice President of Product Management at Accela. With more than 20 years’ experience in Non Profit Tech, Civic Tech, and GovTech, Amber is passionate about solving public problems with technology by looking for smarter, more sustainable solutions that reach better outcomes for communities. For the last decade, she has been driving product strategy for various Accela products and solutions including Civic Platform, Citizen Access, Mobile, and Civic Applications. Prior to joining Accela, she built products that help create a pathway to self-sufficiency for homeless, low-income, and disabled individuals.

As the Minneapolis CIO for seven-plus years, Otto Doll was responsible for all city IT services. He also served as South Dakota’s CIO for 15 years with responsibility for all state government computing, telecommunications, radio and public broadcasting. While with IT research firms, Otto has advised Fortune 1000, federal, state and local government CIOs on information technology assessment and alignment to business needs. He has served as a director with the United States General Services Administration, developing information technology strategic plans and oversight policy.
Otto received his computer science degree from Virginia Tech and is a senior executive fellow of the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. He is a past president of NASCIO – a national organization of state CIOs. He also is a past president of the Metropolitan Information Exchange (MIX) – a national organization of city and county CIOs. Otto was named to Government Technology's 2004 Top 25 Doers, Dreamers and Drivers.

Steven Ferguson is a 25-year veteran of the IT industry. As the Chief Information Officer for the Technical College System of Georgia (TCSG), he leads a talented team of IT professionals in support of TCSG’s technical education, adult education, economic development, and workforce divisions across the 88 campuses of Georgia’s 22 technical colleges. Ferguson was selected as the 2019 Georgia Non-Profit CIO of the Year and the 2021 Technology Leader of the Year for Innovation. He is currently driving innovation in higher education through the launch of TCSG’s eCampus platform.
Ferguson holds an M.S. in Information Technology from Southern Polytechnic State
University, a B.S. in Business Administration, Information Technology from Columbia
Southern University, an A.S. in Engineering from Gainesville State College, and is a proud graduate of TCSG’s Executive Leadership Academy.
Beyond his service to the State of Georgia, Ferguson is very active in the community, currently serving on the Board of Directors for the Technology Association of Georgia (TAG), as an Advisory Board Member for GeorgiaCIO, and as a volunteer for various non-profit and educational organizations.

Christopher L. Hills has more than 15 years’ experience as a Senior Security and Architecture Engineer operating in highly sensitive environments. Chris is a military veteran of the United States Navy and started with BeyondTrust after his most recent role leading a Privileged Access Management (PAM) team as a Technical Director within a Fortune 500 organization. In his current position, he has responsibilities as a Senior Solutions Architect consulting on PAM implementations and reports to the Office of the CTO as an acting Deputy CTO. In his free time, Chris enjoys spending time with his family on the water with their 32-foot speedboat in the summer and taking to the sand dunes and off-roading in the winter.

Daniele Loffreda is marketing lead for Ciena’s Virtualized Edge Solution State/Local Government and Education (SLED) and Healthcare in Ciena’s Solutions Development organization. In this role, he leads Ciena’s initiatives applying next-generation networking technologies to help these sectors deliver higher quality experiences to their constituents through disruptive technologies, optimized cloud strategies, virtualized infrastructure and improved data security.
Daniele has more than 25 years of experience helping customers leverage information, communications and technology solutions to provide greater value, streamline their operations and generate higher returns on network investments. In addition to his role at Ciena, Daniele has worked in pioneering roles at AT&T, Sprint and Fujitsu. He has presented at numerous industry conferences and published articles and posts on next-generation network connectivity as a critical foundation of enterprise transformation.

Jeff May has served as the Chief Information Officer for the Georgia Department of Labor (GDOL) since 2012, overseeing the agency technology strategy, planning, budget, and operations of the Information Technology Division. May brings over 25 years of IT leadership and Management experience from both the private and public sectors.
While at GDOL, May has worked to design, develop, and implement an agency IT modernization strategy that includes streamlining operations, reducing costs, and modernizing the agency suite of business applications. Under May’s leadership, GDOL became one of the first state agencies to retire a legacy mainframe system and replace it with more modernized infrastructure utilizing a distributed server environment.
In addition to his role as CIO at GDOL, May also currently serves as IT Director and Chairman of the National Association of State Workforce Agencies (NASWA) Information Technology Support Center (ITSC) Steering Committee.

Tom is the Chief Information Officer (CIO) for the Department of Revenue and has been in that role for over 5 years. Prior to joining the Department of Revenue, he was the CIO for The Department of Corrections and the Department of Driver Services. Before joining the state, Mr. McMurry served in private sector leadership positions in public account, banking and commercial real estate.  He earned his Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Georgia State University.

Seeing is believing. That’s why visualization technologies – particularly geospatial, or mapping tools – are indispensable components of Government Services. Leveraging these technologies makes government more efficient and effective – it saves tax-payer dollars and opens the door to better accountability, planning, decision-making, economic development, storytelling, citizen services and public safety – improving the overall prosperity of the state of Georgia and its citizens.
Susan Miller, Georgia’s Geospatial Information Officer (or GIO), leads the state’s new Geospatial Information Office (Office/Team), whose role is to orchestrate bringing such mapping tools to bear for every level of government throughout the state. To do this, her team builds programs and leads collaboration efforts to develop and maintain critical geospatial data and applications for all, including the design and implementation of supporting legislation, policies, standards, best practices, business process and change management required for success.
Her team partners with local, regional, and state level government, along with federal agencies, universities, and the private sector to facilitate their cross-cutting interdisciplinary work. They strive to instill the value of data throughout Georgia government as the mission critical asset it is, and to successfully facilitate connections between people, organizations, data, and systems across multiple sectors resulting in greater returns on any single investment in data and technologies.
Prior to joining the team in Georgia, Susan was the Director of a global GIS program for The Nature Conservancy, the world’s largest conservation organization, where she led the design and implementation of organizational-wide geospatial strategies in support of approximately 3,500 GIS practitioners in 48 countries and all US States.
Susan’s undergrad and graduate degrees focus on the application of geospatial sciences to solve complex problems facing our world today. She has served on many Boards, including Georgia Tech’s Centre for GIS, as well as the National States Geographic Information Council (NSGIC), a group which advocates State interests on national geospatial policy and initiatives.
She has received distinguished honors for her work in Georgia, including: a Special Achievement Award from Esri for advancing geospatial sciences and technology as a leader in the states data response efforts surrounding Covid-19; named one of the nation’s Top 50 Leaders in State Government and Information Technology in 2019 for making state government more efficient and effective through the implementation of new technologies, as well as one of the Top 50 Women in Technology in the United States in 2018 for her dedication, excellence, and successful promotion of the use of technology from StateScoop; in 2017 she received an Innovation Award for using technology to streamline the workflow of administering the US Federal Transportation Bill in Georgia from the National Association of Development Organizations; and in 2016 was awarded the Outstanding Service Award for advancing state and national geospatial technologies from NSGIC.

Joseph Morris is the deputy chief innovation officer for the Center for Digital Government and a national keynote speaker on issues, trends and drivers impacting state and local government and education. He has authored publications and reports on funding streams, technology investment areas and public-sector priorities, and has led roundtables, projects and initiatives focused on issues within the public sector. Joe has conducted state and local government research with e.Republic since 2007 and knows the ins and outs of government on all levels. He received his Bachelor of Arts in government and international relations from the California State University, Sacramento.

As Chief Technology Officer for the state of Georgia, Steve Nichols advises leadership of the Georgia Technology Authority and other state agencies on critical technology issues.
He has played a key role in numerous initiatives to modernize the state’s IT infrastructure and served on national boards responsible for developing and recommending technology policies and practices.
He provides executive leadership for Georgia’s official state website, www.georgia.gov, including several critical enterprise applications and the webMethods Enterprise Service Bus. Georgia’s web publishing platform, which supports 85+ state agency websites and relies on Drupal, an open-source management system, is known for its use of best practices in web design, navigation, accessibility and accommodation of mobile devices.
Dr. Nichols received the prestigious State Technology Innovator Award for 2017 from the National Association of State Chief Information Officers (NASCIO) for his leadership and adoption of emerging technology and innovation in service delivery. In 2012, Government Technology named Dr. Nichols as one of the nation’s Top 25 Doers, Dreamers and Drivers in recognition of his contributions to advancing information technology in government.
Before coming to GTA in 2002, he was a principal consultant at Daugherty Business Solutions in Atlanta. He holds a Ph.D. in physics from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Destah is a senior technology professional and innovation enthusiast who over 20+ years has built a career around driving business disruption, customer advocacy, and connecting good ideas and good people. He is a veteran of several small Silicon Valley startups as well as some of the biggest tech industry behemoths. From his early years as an electrical engineer to his current technical sales leadership position, he has touched data networking, wireless data and machine learning technologies as a customer-facing evangelist and problem solver.

Jason Sankey is a strategic change agent with nearly two decades of progressive leadership and experience in operations and technology. He is known for his ability to effectively collaborate across business lines while continuously driving innovation.
Jason brings his immense experience as a technology leader to the City of Atlanta as the chief information officer (CIO) of the Department of Atlanta Information Management (AIM). In this role, he is accountable for delivering information technology services to all 25 departments, including Public Safety, Justice, Operations, Administration and Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport.
Jason is widely known for his executive leadership, technology foresight, and thought-provoking strategies in transforming organizations. He strives to balance innovation with a realistic approach to advancing technology while integrating the City’s goals with efficient services.
Previous to joining AIM, Jason served as the CIO of the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services (ODJFS). While working at ODJFS, he used his exemplary budget and operation management skills to oversee technology solutions for the department’s $3.5 billion budget while also developing and supervising the States’ public assistance services.
Jason has a track record of building talented, highly accomplished teams that demonstrate excellence and consistently produce impactful results. Prior to joining ODJFS, he spent 13 years as vice president at Citigroup in New York City and Columbus, Ohio.
Recognized as a consummate professional and determined leader who perseveres through challenging times, Jason was awarded the 2020 state of Ohio agency CIO of the year and was the recipient of the COVID-19 hero award.
Jason prides himself on the impact he makes within communities through his work serving as a public service executive. Jason serves on various community boards where he stresses collaboration and seeks enterprise solutions while focusing on maximizing technology through customer experience.

Trent has over 20 years of experience working in the Public Sector, holding a variety of positions in IT operations, network architecture, software development & automation. He has managed numerous Systems Engineering teams focused on software-defined networking, Secure access service edge (SASE) and cybersecurity. Currently he is proud to be a leader at Palo Alto Networks, the global leader in cybersecurity, supporting Public Sector engineering teams across the East coast, who are focused on guiding our customers through cybersecurity challenges.

Jessica Simmons serves as the Deputy CIO for Broadband and Special Projects at the Georgia Technology Authority (GTA).
Prior to joining GTA in July 2021, she served as a Deputy Commissioner at the Georgia Department of Revenue where she oversaw the Legal Affairs and Tax Policy Division, the Department’s law enforcement divisions, and the Department’s communications and legislative programs.
She began her career in public service in the Georgia Secretary of State’s Office. After working in Washington, D.C., Simmons returned to Georgia as the Assistant Director of the Georgia Elections Division and later served as Chief of Staff in the Secretary of State’s Office.
Simmons is a native of Marietta and holds a bachelor’s degree in Political Science from the University of Georgia. Simmons and her husband, Matt, live with their two children in Sandy Springs.

Mr. Sandeep Sinha is part of Insight’s Digital Innovation National Sales Team and leads Insight’s Smart City and IoT initiatives. He is responsible for driving strategy and execution of Genetec partnership along with other ecosystem partners to deliver business outcomes for our customers. Mr. Sinha has worked with both large companies and startups such as Microsoft, Motorola and Trustonic. He has a Masters in Computer Science and an MBA from University of Chicago.

James C. Stallings grew up in McCaysville, GA and currently lives in Paulding County with his wife, Stephanie, and their three children. He joined the Department of Public Safety in 2008 as a trooper in the Georgia State Patrol, and he left his role as Director of the Department of Public Safety’s Dignitary Protection Unit to serve as GEMA/HS Director.

With over 21 years of information technology, security leadership, and risk management experience, Bindu has an exceptional record of success leading multiple, diverse cross-functional security and risk governance teams to plan, analyze, and implement information security programs to support organizational business objectives. Bindu provides strategic and tactical cybersecurity consulting services to customers and collaborates with clients on cybersecurity, technology transformation, cyber-risk, compliance, and data governance initiatives. She leads a team of security professionals responsible for providing consultative services specific to Trusted Advisor engagement, Incident Response, Forensics, Threat/Vulnerability Management services, & compliance assessments.

Bob Swiggum leads the strategic K-12 connectivity and infrastructure planning support and initiatives for Georgia’s schools and districts.

Teri Takai is vice president of the Center for Digital Government, a national research and advisory institute on information technology policies and best practices in state and local government. She worked for Ford Motor Company for 30 years in global application development and information technology strategic planning. From Ford, she moved to EDS in support of General Motors. A long-time interest in public service led her to the government sector, first as CIO of the State of Michigan, then as CIO of the State of California and, subsequently, the CIO of the U.S. Department of Defense, the first woman appointed to this role. She then served as the CIO for Meridian Health Plan.
Teri is a member of several industry advisory boards. She has won numerous awards including Governing magazine’s Public Official of the Year, CIO Magazine’s CIO Hall of Fame, Government Technology magazine’s Top 25 Doers, Dreamers & Drivers, the Women in Defense Excellence in Leadership Award and the Department of Defense Medal for Distinguished Public Service.

Herb is a State, Local and Education Strategist. Having history in various government CIO roles he is responsible for assisting customers achieve their strategic outcomes through understanding their business issues and how policy can impact business outcomes. He has been sharing best practices learned from around the country on optimization, workforce modernization and hybrid cloud. He also is providing insight in practical implementations of AI, Smart Communities and blockchain at many government conferences. Prior to joining in 2018, VMware Herb served as the State of Wisconsin Deputy State CIO and CTO, CIO for Health and Family Services and Corrections.

As Executive Editor at e.Republic, Steve is responsible for the coordination of editorial strategies and standards across all the firm’s media platforms. He directs the editorial teams that produce Government Technology, Emergency Management and Digital Communities and their respective Websites, in addition to developing and maintaining corporate policies and standards for editorial. Steve has over 20 years of writing and editing experience including more than 17 years covering technology in the state and local government market.
Steve joined e.Republic in 1996. During his tenure, e.Republic’s print and electronic media have received many awards for editorial excellence, including “Magazine of the Year” from ASBPE for Emergency Management in 2013, “Best New Web Site” from ASBPE for emergencymgmt.com in 2009, ”Best Overall Publication” at the Maggie awards for Government Technology in 2008 and “Magazine of the Year” from ASBPE for Public CIO in 2007.

Jim Tyson is a Solution Architect for the SAIC Solutions and Technology Group. Jim joined SAIC in 2016, and leads Federal and State government technical solution designs and business proposal development efforts. In 2019, he was named an SAIC Fellow for his leadership and contributions in developing innovative solutions to complex customer systems requirements.
Prior to joining SAIC, Jim worked for more than 25 years for a Washington DC IT consulting company, including as a systems analyst, technical team leader, project manager, and COO.
Jim has led the design and development of private, public, and hybrid cloud based solutions for Government customers since 2009. Two of the systems he developed were cited by the Office of Management and Budget as exemplars of successful Federal agency cloud migrations.
Jim has an MBA and a JD degree. He is a TOGAF-certified Enterprise Architect, and holds DevOps Foundation and PMP certifications.

Kimberly Watkins has been a consistent top-performing Senior Sales Executive for software organizations selling SaaS/PaaS software to large enterprise accounts utilizing connectivity, data, analytics, workflow enablement and IoT technology to solve operational problems and improve productivity, increasing ROI for these customers. Her expertise includes creating long-term partnerships with customers to help them solve problems and drive value.
Kimberly currently works with DocuSign managing the State of Georgia for State and Local government. She has also worked with startups focused on PaaS, AI and Machine learning and was the top performer for 7 years at Telogis. Her experience includes Sybase/SAP selling Mobility platforms, GuardedNet Security solutions and SalesTechnologies/D&B Software selling CRM solutions internationally. She earned her BS in Computer Science from Lipscomb University in Nashville. She has two children and outside of work she enjoys golf and traveling on scuba diving adventures.

Angela Welle works in Deloitte’s Customer Strategy and Applied Design practice and has helped elevate the human experience in over 20 government agencies, including 6 states. She has nine years’ experience in strategy consulting, including serving as the lead project manager of researchers, marketers, designers, developers, and security team in launching a State’s business one stop portal and supporting enterprise strategy with the State’s new digital services team. She has extensive experience in human-centered design, employee and citizen experience, ethnographic field research, service design for large IT systems, surveys, executive facilitation and workshops, and vision development. Prior to Deloitte, Angela served four years as a Legislative Aide in the United States Senate. She has an MBA from the College of William & Mary and a BSBA from The Ohio State University.