Building engagement across local governments was a recurring theme during a whole-of-state panel discussion at last month's ISAC Annual Summit.* As the concept has evolved over the past decade, state cybersecurity leaders said they have learned that engaging local governments early, working through trusted partners and respecting local autonomy are essential to successful statewide cybersecurity programs. Moderator Karen Sorady said one definition of whole-of-state cybersecurity is a unified effort to coordinate collaboration and address shared cyber risks across state and local government, education, and sometimes industry and nonprofit partners. Sorady is the vice president of strategy and plans for the Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center (MS-ISAC), which hosted the summit. “We don’t have an official definition, but we’ve been living it for years,” Tennessee Deputy CISO Aimé Nsengiyumva said. “We’ve been trying to figure out how we can work closely with local government organizations, how to support them, how to help them, but also how to work together.” Nsengiyumva also said his state includes local leaders in developing cybersecurity initiatives through its cybersecurity advisory council and other committees, where officials help shape programs and evaluation criteria. State leaders also speak at conferences hosted by organizations such as the Tennessee Municipal League. This type of association can be key for finding trusted messengers and connectors. In New York, Meghan Cook is director of the Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Services' Cyber Incident Response Team, and she has researched technology and cybersecurity for many years. During her tenure with the University at Albany, she said developing a cybersecurity primer with various professional public-sector organizations gave additional credibility to recommendations that had been made elsewhere. The Cybersecurity Primer for Local Government Leaders, published in 2022 by the University at Albany's Center for Technology in Government, was created in partnership with the