Approximately 40 department heads from the cities of Scottsbluff, Gering, Terrytown and Scotts Bluff County met Wednesday to discuss what is being done and what can be done cooperatively to save money for the four local government entities. Scottsbluff Mayor Randy Meininger says the meeting, the first ever of its kind, arose from a joint meeting of the Scottsbluff and Gering city councils earlier this year.

Meininger says technology was one of the big topics Wednesday , including making sure the entities can share information with the software being used. Meininger says there was also talk about joint capital purchases, getting the two cities ordinances in line with each other, and combined bidding of street projects.

Meininger says the department heads also promised to talk at least monthly in the future about cooperative efforts.