ACCIS Fall Conference 2026 agenda
October 19–23, 2026, Muckleshoot Casino Resort, Auburn, WA
Monday, October 19: Arrival and opening day
Registration Open
Welcome & Opening Remarks
- Tiffany Quatmann, Senior Enterprise Solutions Manager, Information Technology, City of Bellevue
Microsoft Presentation
Break
Unmasking Real-World Frontier AI Threats
Frontier AI is transforming cyber threats, acting as a force multiplier across the kill chain. Adversaries leverage AI to scale social engineering, accelerate vulnerability discovery, and iterate malicious code. In this session, Unit 42 shares practical insights into the evolving AI threat landscape, using real-world examples of AI-enabled attacks we've discovered in the wild. Attendees will also learn practical solutions to mitigate agentic attacks.
Break
City Collaboration Session
- Tiffany Quatmann, City of Bellevue
- Chad Goodhue, ACCIS President, Information Technology Director, City of Richland
County Collaboration Session
- Randy Hensel, Sr. Security Analyst, Walla Walla County
- Mike Sprinkle, Chief Technology Officer, Clark County
Refresh & Recharge
Members' Dinner: An Evening Together
Join fellow ACCIS members for dinner and an evening together, sponsored by Palo Alto. We'll take time to honor the memory of our friend and fellow board member, Kathryn A. Fugere, reflecting on the connections she made and the part she played in our association.
Tuesday, October 20: Keynote, leadership and learning labs
Breakfast
Opening Remarks · PCs for People & the Passport Program
- Tiffany Quatmann, City of Bellevue
ACCIS welcome and an introduction to PCs for People, the organization ACCIS is supporting through this year's Passport Program. PCs for People provides free e-waste recycling and data destruction and helps get refurbished computers into the hands of low-income community members.
Keynote · Leading with Trust: AI, Cybersecurity and the Future of Public Service
- Theresa Payton
Public-sector IT leaders face a shared challenge: use emerging technology to improve services while protecting the systems, information, and public trust their communities depend on. Theresa Payton explores the opportunities and risks of AI through the lens of public service, connecting responsible innovation, cyber resilience, and leadership.
Showcase & Passport Program Time
Leadership Mindset
- Nash Consulting
Explore leadership practices that strengthen morale, engagement, and healthy workplaces, including emotional intelligence, feedback, power dynamics, and management skills.
Break
Psychological Safety
- Nash Consulting
Build teams where people can raise concerns, ask questions, and acknowledge mistakes while maintaining accountability and performance expectations.
Lunch · The App Modernization Trap (and How to Climb Out)
- Peter Fine
We migrated, we containerized, but why does everything still seem so fragile? This session breaks down the five modernization traps we keep falling into, and what climbing out actually takes, layer by layer.
Copilot Studio Workshop · Part 1 of 2
- Lucas De Nadai
- Yvonne Hamilton
Hands-on Copilot Studio workshop: build a solution across two 90-minute sessions.
Learning Lab · Accidental Architecture: How Urgent Priorities Create Security Risk · Part 1 of 2
- Linsey Gallo, Cybersecurity Compliance Manager
Government organizations often inherit complex technology environments shaped by years of urgent operational needs, budget constraints, staffing challenges, and well-intentioned decisions. This interactive workshop explores how temporary exceptions, legacy systems, governance gaps, and accumulated technical debt can gradually create security risks, and uses practical examples and Secure by Design principles to show how to recognize hidden risk, strengthen governance, and make technology decisions that improve resilience.
Learning Lab · Putting AI Agents to Work in Local Government · Part 1 of 2
Learn how to delegate municipal work to AI agents with clear instructions, practical safeguards, and human accountability. This hands-on Learning Lab introduces a tool-agnostic method for identifying suitable workflows, designing AI-assisted processes, and testing and refining them before use. Through live demonstration and guided practice with a sanitized municipal case study, participants leave with worksheets, reusable templates, and a repeatable method.
Showcase & Passport Program Time
Learning Lab · Accidental Architecture: How Urgent Priorities Create Security Risk · Part 2 of 2
- Linsey Gallo, Cybersecurity Compliance Manager
Learning Lab · Putting AI Agents to Work in Local Government · Part 2 of 2
Refresh & Recharge
Partner Reception & Jam Night
Wednesday, October 21: Breakout tracks and partner sessions
Breakfast
GitHub Copilot for Government IT Teams
- Gina Kirby, Director for Cloud and AI
- Nabil Ahmed, Solution Engineer
- Kirthi Kumar, Solution Architect, King County Software Engineering
Practical GitHub Copilot use cases for public sector developers and IT organizations, with real-world examples focused on productivity, code quality, and modernization.
Giving Feedback Without Hurting Morale
- Nash Consulting
Practice feedback that maintains trust while setting clear performance expectations. Explore coaching, recognition, and follow-up conversations.
Break
AI Continuum: From Fit to Foundry Frontier Planning
Microsoft's AI Continuum approach in a fast-paced "speed dating" format: when Fit, Need, and related AI offerings apply, and the path from AI exploration to production deployment.
Behavior Styles & Appreciating Our Differences
- Nash Consulting
Explore behavior styles to strengthen self-awareness, adapt communication, recognize stress cues, and improve collaboration, meetings, and decision-making.
Break
To be announced
Breakout Session
M365 Copilot Personas and Adoption
Persona-based Microsoft 365 Copilot scenarios and how they were built, with guidance for building an internal Copilot enablement and training program.
Showcase Networking & Passport Program
Governance in the Age of Agents
- Nadia Hansen, Global AI GTM Leader, Industry Advisor for Public Sector, Salesforce
Agentic AI in government runs on trusted data. Data architectures built for reporting fall short of what agents need, and when governance is missing, AI fails silently: eroding trust, leaking sensitive data, stalling decisions. Drawing on deployments across policing, DMV, property management, and retirement insurance, this session offers a framework for governing AI at scale.
UEBA Evolved: Insider Threat in the World of Agentic AI
- Grant Leonard, Field CISO
As AI evolves from assistant to autonomous actor, what happens when the "user" is an AI agent? How insider-threat detection must adapt to identify abnormal agent behavior, validate legitimate agent access, and address the risks of AI acting independently.
Lunch · Passport Program Reminder
Lunch includes a short reminder about PCs for People, ACCIS's support, and participation through the Passport Program.
Fighting Fire with Fire: Using AI to Defeat AI-Powered Cyberattacks
- Mark Matthews, Senior Sales Engineer
A live demonstration of AI-powered threat hunting and XDR: uncover malicious activity in minutes, reduce analyst workload, and contain attacks before significant damage occurs.
Break
From AI Ready to AI Resilient: Building Trusted Digital Government
- Dr. Sanjay Shirude, Director, AI and Digital Transformation
AI is transforming government services, but successful adoption requires more than technology. A practical, vendor-neutral approach for local governments to move from AI readiness to AI resilience by connecting trusted data, cybersecurity, governance, process improvement, and responsible AI. Through public-sector scenarios, attendees will learn how to identify high-value AI opportunities, establish appropriate guardrails, and build secure, resilient, and citizen-focused digital services.
Attackers Already Know. Do You? A Practical Look at Attack Surface Management
- Gary Quinn, Senior Sales Engineer
How greater visibility into your digital footprint can help uncover hidden risks, identify overlooked internet-facing assets, prioritize remediation, and stay ahead of emerging threats.
Break
Governing AI Agents and Protecting Public Data in the Agentic Era
AI agents are moving into core government workflows faster than most agencies' policies can keep up. What responsible AI use means once agents can take autonomous action: building use policies that hold up when agents act autonomously, enforcing real-time guardrails and agent identity and permissions, recovering from agentic mistakes, and a practical framework for starting or maturing your agency's AI governance program.
Purpose-Built Network with AI and for AI
- Derek Juergens, Mist AI Specialist
Is AI really the answer to growing network complexity and scale, cybersecurity risks, and limited IT resources? The right AI could be. Current case studies and a live demonstration of Mist AI: client-level visibility, AI-driven operations and support, and what a network purpose-built with AI and for AI could do for your organization.
Break
Cybersecurity and Compliance for 2026
- Chris Green, Director of Governance, Risk, and Compliance
Aligning cybersecurity, privacy, and compliance programs with the realities of 2026: current threat trends, executive accountability, the impact of AI on risk management, and a practical framework connecting NIST CSF 2.0, HIPAA, CJIS, PCI DSS 4.0, CMMC, and emerging privacy laws to security program design.
Resilience by Design: Preparing Local Government for Disruption
- Curt Smerud, Chief Resilience Officer
Cities and counties face growing risks from cyber incidents, natural disasters, infrastructure failures, and other disruptions that can impact critical services. Explore the key elements of organizational resilience and the importance of planning before a crisis occurs: business continuity and disaster recovery (BC/DR) strategies, technology considerations, and practical steps local governments can take to strengthen preparedness, maintain operations, and recover more quickly.
Break
Designing UCaaS for Modern Government
- Mark Vogl, Director of Microsoft Engineering
Modern collaboration platforms offer more flexibility than ever, but government IT teams still need the reliability, usability, and operational discipline of enterprise telephony. Explore the fundamentals of Unified Communications as a Service (UCaaS), how proven telephony practices carry forward into cloud-based collaboration, and how to translate organizational requirements and user needs into a flexible, purpose-built communications environment.
The Patch Gap: Keeping City Infrastructure Resilient in the Post-Mythos Era
- Josh Tegart, Solutions Engineer, Cisco
AI is accelerating both the discovery and exploitation of vulnerabilities while municipal IT teams operate with finite staff and systems that can't always be patched immediately. A practical look at closing that gap with better intelligence and new protection mechanisms, without sacrificing availability.
Thursday, October 22: Full day and final Showcase morning
Breakfast
Opening Remarks
- Tiffany Quatmann, City of Bellevue
Assume Breach. Protect Essential Services. Containing AI-Powered Cyberattacks Across Washington's Public Sector
- Jesse Shairi, Sr. Sales Engineer
As AI accelerates the speed and sophistication of cyberattacks, Washington's counties, cities, PUDs, tribal governments, and state agencies must be prepared to contain breaches before they disrupt critical services. Learn how Zero Trust Segmentation helps limit ransomware spread, secure IT and OT environments, and maintain mission-critical operations.
Final Showcase · last chance to visit the Partner Showcase
Beyond VMware: Choosing Your Best Path with Azure Local and Windows Server Hyper-V
Many VMware customers are reassessing their future. A look at Microsoft's dual-platform approach with Azure Local and Windows Server Hyper-V, and how Washington State local government agencies have embraced both paths to modernize at their own pace.
Break
Copilot Studio: Show Me What You Built
A follow-up showcase for participants to demonstrate what they built during the Copilot Studio workshop.
Lunch · Police Drones as First Responders
- Detective Michael Thompson, Renton Police Department
Lunch includes a presentation and demonstration of police drones as first responders, including a screen-shared drone flight in Renton.
Generative AI Beyond Copilot
- Enzhou Wang, Chief Technology Officer, City of Tacoma
Break
AOC Presentation
- Young Yoon, Director, Information Technology, City of Renton
OSS: Secure the Software Supply Chain
Examine the Shai-hulud attack and Microsoft's S2C2F framework for securing software development against supply-chain attacks: eight practices, the maturity model, and how tools and techniques map to those practices.
Break
To be announced
Member Breakout
Lessons Learned from DevOps at King County
Explore the growing pains of a development team and lessons that software developers and managers can apply in their own organizations.
Break
Free Cyber Hygiene Support from the State Auditor
- Dan Mann, Cybersecurity Specialist, Office of the Washington State Auditor
The free cybersecurity resources available from the State Auditor's Office: the cybersecurity resource library, the Cyber Checkup, and an Incident Response Workshop to help organizations create or strengthen their incident response plan.
To be announced
Member Breakout
Refresh & Recharge
Members Only Dinner
Friday, October 23: Closing half day
Breakfast
SIG Cybersecurity
ACCIS Community Forum: What We Learned, What Comes Next
- Tiffany Quatmann, City of Bellevue
Join fellow ACCIS members from cities, counties, ports, tribes, and special districts to reflect on the week and help shape what comes next. Share ideas you're taking home, explore open questions, and identify opportunities to learn from and support one another.
Closing Remarks
- Tiffany Quatmann, City of Bellevue
Check-out & Break
Membership Meeting
- Chad Goodhue, ACCIS President, Information Technology Director, City of Richland