As part of her participation in the professional planning community, Ms. Walz is a frequent speaker and contributor to local, statewide and national conference sessions.

Ms. Walz served as a panelist for the 2003 symposium “The Future of Texas City-Regions” sponsored by the School of Architecture at The University of Texas at Austin. She was a lecturer for the University of Wisconsin’s 1996 Planning and Zoning for Community Land-Use Management Institute, presented in Charlotte, North Carolina; Madison, Wisconsin; and Albuquerque, New Mexico. Her session addressed “Effective Planning for Changing Communities: A Look at Traditional and Strategic Comprehensive Planning Techniques”. In 1997, Ms. Walz was a speaker for the Charles & Shirley Weiss Urban Livability Symposium on Sustainable Development at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, addressing “Sustainability for an Urban Community”.

Presentation topics have included:

Growth and Development in North Texas: Looking at all the Options

Vision North Texas and Beyond: Current Trends in Future Analysis

Climate Change Policy: Planning and Election Year Influence

Climate Change and Planning

Scenarios and Visioning Planning

Anybody Seen My Cheese: How To Deal With Change

Vision North Texas

Creating Sustainable Communities Through Nature and Culture

Big Regions, Grand Visions

Visioning Through Reality Check

Regional Visioning, Texas Style

Planners and Politics

Tourism Trends in Wilderness and City

Sustainable Communities along Dallas’ Trinity River

Great Cities, Great Plans

Development Excellence: Sustainable Community Design in a “Big City” Region

Sustainable Development

Beyond Neighborhood: Designing the Community and Region

Wayfinding for Cities, Towns and Communities

Private Planning in the Public Interest

Texas Planning: An Overview

Making Great Texas Communities Happen

Can I Say That? Working with the Media

Is Smart Growth the Opposite of Dumb Growth?

Sustainable Environmental Excellence: The Regional Geometry of the Future

Center City Dallas: An Emerging Downtown for a 21st Century Region

Reflections on Dallas Water

Smart Growth Texas Style

Plan Implementation Through Community Action

The Trinity River: Using Capital Investments to Reshape a Major Texas City

Creating Livable 21st Century Cities

Planning: What Works and What Doesn’t

The Role of Non-Governmental Organizations in Regional Planning

Capital Improvement Planning

The Dallas Plan (numerous presentations to professional planning and economic development conferences, community groups and media)

Consensus in the Face of Conflict

Implementation of an Action Plan Through Consensus-Building

Bringing the Region into Focus Around Downtown

Water in the City: Revitalizing & Reimagining Dallas

Comprehensive Planning

Consensus-Building for Sustainable Communities

Sustainable Urban/Rural Communities

Shaping Kansas City's Future

Lessons from Austinplan

Public Meetings without Mace

Intergovernmental Cooperation: Obstacles and Opportunities