Chris Stewart is a highly accomplished and leader in the field of municipal Information Technology. A veteran of the United States Air Force, following his service Chris began a 23 year career with the City of Austin rising from System Support Technician to Chief Information Officer (2020 - 2023).

As Chief Information Officer (CIO) for the City of Austin, Chris led a pioneering digital transformation, revolutionizing the city’s technological landscape.

Notable achievements included the successful implementation of the City’s secure Salesforce COVID testing solution, which seamlessly transitioned into a vaccine management platform. This highly-collaborative initiative played a pivotal role in the city’s pandemic response and ensured the safety of its citizens.

Before his tenure as the City CIO, Chris held the position of CIO at Austin Water. He was the technical lead and an executive sponsor for the utility’s $100 million Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) project, laying the groundwork for secure and seamless data integration between cloud-hosted systems and utility platforms.

He created the utility’s first security team and worked with SCADA management institutionalizing the first ever security policy. Chris expertly built trust between IT, OT, and operations to usher in a new era of data sharing and management.

Throughout his career, Chris has been a trailblazer in adopting innovative technologies. He championed the migration of critical services to the cloud and implemented mobile solutions, which proved to be instrumental in ensuring continuity of operations during the pandemic.