PROFILES: JEFF LEE, CIVIL ENGINEER

By Rebekah Oulton, PhD, PE

I first met Jeff Lee when we were both volunteering for a show at the San Luis Obispo Little theater. Neither of us knew the other was an engineer until several months or perhaps even years into our friendship.  That’s community theater – someone’s “real life” doesn’t necessarily come up very often.

But engineering has actually been a central part of Jeff Lee’s life since 1989, when he graduated from Merrimack College in Massachusetts with a degree in Civil Engineering.  After college, Jeff relocated to Calaveras County in California, where he both entered the preliminary rounds of the celebrated frog jumping contest and earned his PE license.  In Calaveras, he worked with a number of Cal Poly grads who turned him on to the idea of living in the San Luis Obispo area.  He relocated here in 1994, just after the Highway 41 fire.

In SLO, Jeff first worked for Greg Luke & Associates, then moved over to EDA in 1997.  (During this period, Jeff’s involvement with theater became more important as well – in 1997, he met and married his lovely wife Mary during a production of the Mikado at the PAC.  )  At EDA, he developed a focus on design and build of gas stations.  Gas station design/build became Jeff’s primary area of specialty when he opened his own firm LHB in 2006.  His clients included gas stations and grocery stores from La Jolla to Redding, including the Oak Hill Shopping Center in Nacimiento.

In 2012, Jeff accepted his current position with SLO County Utilities Division as the Capital Projects Manager, ironically (as he points out) in charge of flooding projects and drought projects.  He worked on the Arroyo Grande Creek Water Management Program (flood control) and the CSA 23 intertie project between Santa Margarita and Atascadero Mutual Water Company (drought relief).  In 2012, Jeff also was elected to a 4-year term on the Grover Beach City Council.

Jeff still does theater, now and then.  He can occasionally be found performing with Murder in Mind Productions or other local theaters, where he has performed as everything from a murderer to an idiotic pirate to a – well, you name it (that’s theater too).  But his responsibilities for the County of SLO and the Grover Beach City Council keep him pretty busy these days.

Jeff is going to share some details of his City Council responsibilities with us at the January 15 lunch meeting.  His topic: Measure K – a $48 million bond for much needed road repair in Grover Beach. Come to the meeting and learn all about it.  And ask Jeff to do his pirate impression...