Mayor Scott Avedisian is one of 31 mayors from around the globe attending the 32nd International Mayors Conference this week in Israel, hosted by the American Jewish Congress and American Council for World Jewry.

Avedisian is excited by the focus of the conference – breakthrough technologies for cities focusing on issues and challenges facing urban centers.

Pointing out that he attended the conference eight years ago, which helped formulate ideas for City Centre, the mayor said he is looking forward to sessions dealing with aviation, security and cybersecurity. He expects to learn of trends as well as share ideas with other mayors.

“These are some of the things I should be thinking about,” he said Friday. The mayor left Saturday and is scheduled to return this Friday. His attendance is by invitation and the cost of the conference does not require the expenditure of taxpayer dollars.

The conference opened Sunday at the Waldorf Astoria in Jerusalem and included a visit to Mobileye and talks with representatives from OrCam Technologies and other high-tech companies. According to the agenda, Mobileye is one of the leading global technology companies in driverless technology and in the development of vision analysis for Advanced Driver Assistance Systems and autonomous driving. The Mobileye system reportedly reduces collisions significantly, saves fuel and other operational costs, and protects lives. OrCam’s mission is to harness the power of artificial vision by incorporating pioneering technology into a wearable platform, which improves the lives of individuals who are blind, visually impaired and have reading difficulties.

And that was all within the first day.

That evening the Mayor of Jerusalem, Nir Barkat, hosted an opening ceremony dinner at the City Hall.

On Monday the group was slated to have an exclusive meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as well as meet with Ilanit Melchior, Director of Tourism, Jerusalem Development Authority and visit the Jerusalem Entrepreneur Tourism Hub. At the hub they were scheduled to see the system used to collect anonymous location data from tourists designed to provide analytics based on the way a tourist travels the city. The information enables planners to better plan public transportation, tourist attractions and more.

That afternoon the group left for Tel Aviv. Among other stops attendees were slated to get a tour of the city’s command center, described as “the heart of managing Tel Aviv.”

The center was designed to improve the security of residents in routine and emergency situations, and to streamline the services provided by the municipality. The system is based on camera-based command and control technology, panic buttons and end-user equipment, and has been implemented in various other cities.

From the center the group is scheduled to visit m-Prest and R-MOR. m-Prest projects include the world-renowned "Iron Dome" Missile Defense System, critical facilities protection for IEC and the first of its kind Asset Health Management System for predicting electrical transformer condition.

m-Prest is a leading provider of monitoring, controlling and analyzing software for the Industrial Internet of Things (IoT), Homeland Security and Safe and Smart cities. Its product-based platform “connects the dots” across diverse standards and complex systems. Acting as a "System of Systems," the company is active in the following global markets.

R-MOR specializes in the protection of high-risk assets worldwide.

The conference also includes a visit to the Dead Sea and Masada National Park.

In addition to mayors from five American cities, conference participants include mayors from cities in Poland, Belgium, Ethiopia, Brazil, the Czech Republic, Taiwan, Botswana, Nepal and Peru, to name a few.