Mr. Dave Thomas, Director of the Joint Federal Programs Office with the US Army Corps of Engineers, Sacramento District, gave a delightful and impressive presentation on the Folsom Dam Improvements. With a long and meritorious career spanning several decades and continents, Mr. Thomas swept into the room with his assistant, Captain Michael Meyer, and offered up computer renderings, time-lapsed photos, and a slide show to capture the challenging and important Folsom Dam improvements. Jon Balzer with Granite Construction also assisted with the presentation and provided follow-up information about some of the unique challenges they are facing in the current phase.

Scheduled for completion in October 2017 (right before the next presidential election), the ultimate goal of the Folsom Dam improvements is to reduce downstream flood risk. A new spillway and auxiliary control structure are under construction that will allow earlier and greater releases from the lake when necessary. The 40-foot-tall by 40-foot-wide steel gates that will be placed within the auxiliary control structure will discharge water into a 3,027-foot-long, concrete-lined spillway. The maximum discharge from the dam will be increased from 160,000 to 312,000 cubic feet per second.

Mr. Thomas’s role in this complicated construction project involves not only leadership in maintaining a tight schedule, but also quality control and safety. Since his involvement, numerous safety enhancements have been added to provide a safer environment in all areas of the site. For the concrete placement on the control structure, Mr. Thomas brought in experts from the American Concrete Institute to assist in developing site-specific requirements for concrete cold joint construction.

Eager to share his hard-earned experiences, Mr. Thomas offered advice on how to sell a project without using typical Gantt charts. In the presentation, Mr. Thomas showed the project construction graphically in steps, with each step being illustrated over the same background, providing an almost storybook flow. This gave a very concise yet easy to follow illustration of how the project would be constructed and phased. Mr. Thomas also emphasized the need for engineers to keep in mind the political and social structure involved in design and construction of projects.

Other project challenges include the need for a complicated cofferdam for the final excavation on the lake side of the control structure, the complex stormwater discharge requirements for both the construction site and the on-site concrete batch plant, and coordinating numerous subcontractors and their equipment.

Mr. Thomas meets monthly with the project stakeholders, including the Bureau of Reclamation, the Sacramento Area Flood Control Agency, the California Department of Water Resources, Central Valley Flood Protection Board and two U.S. Congressional members. This Joint Federal Project is one of the largest ongoing projects in the Corps.

A native of Texas, Mr. Thomas received his bachelor’s degree in engineering from Texas A&M University in 1985, and his master’s degree in public administration in 1995 from Harvard University.

The speaker for the joint APWA/ACEC lunch on Jan 4th is going to be newly elected Assemblyman, Ken Cooley.

Sworn in as the state’s 8th District representative on December 3, 2012, he said, “As an Assemblymember, I will continue my work representing the people of the 8th District. My door is open, and I look forward to partnering actively with the community and representing them in both my capitol and district office”. District 8 includes the communities of Arden-Arcade, Carmichael, Citrus Heights, Rancho Cordova, Rancho Murieta, Rosemont and Wilton and other portions of unincorporated Sacramento County.

Ken was elected to Rancho Cordova’s first City Council upon its formation in 2002. He was re-elected in 2004 and 2008, running citywide, and has repeatedly been his community’s top vote-getter. He also served as mayor in 2005 and again in 2010 when his city was recognized as an “All American City”.
Ken’s commitment to fiscal conservatism, refined over an 18-year private sector career with State Farm Insurance, helped Rancho Cordova to thrive despite the economic recession. Ken has experience balancing a government budget yearly and maintaining surpluses each year as an elected official. While fiscal strength is difficult for all levels of government today, Ken is very proud that his city received a two-level credit rating increase in 2009, despite the recession.

Assemblyman Cooley plans to continue his successful record of good management and fiscal responsibility to the State Assembly. Some of the topics we anticipate he will address include:

1. Private Sector job growth.
2. State budget – How do we stop relying on tax propositions (eg. Prop. 30)?
3. Position on Professional Services tax.
4. Management of unfunded retirement liabilities for State employees.
5. Local Infrastructure Initiatives.