By Matt Irvin, Staff Writer
Thursday, December 28, 2006
December 28, 2006 01:01 pm
—
The city’s new director of engineering has worked in Stanly County and decided he wanted to return to North Carolina after a stint in Georgia.
“I wanted to come back home,” Jon Mendenhall said. “I really liked working in Stanly County and the people here.”
Mendenhall, 23, will take charge of the engineering services as he fills the position left vacant when Ernest Borders was promoted to director of Public Utilities in March. Mendenhall’s starting salary will be $48,734. His first day on the job was Dec.12.
A native of Trinity, he attended school in Guilford County and has a bachelor’s degree from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. Mendenhall majored in history and has a minor in geology.
“My concentration will be in sedimentary control and flood plain mapping,” he said. “On civil engineering, we usually bid out for those services.”
This is not the first time Mendenhall has worked in the area; he was employed as a planner in the Stanly County Planning Department. Most recently he was the planning director of the combined city-county Tifton-Tift Ga. He also worked part-time for the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in the Geographic Information Systems (GIS) mapping department.
Project management, site plan reviews and inspections and stormwater run off will be some of Mendenhall’s responsibilities.
“I will make sure what needs to be done for stormwater retention is done correctly before issuing permits,” he said. “Once you pave pervious ground you increase stormwater flow into streams.”
The flood plain in the U.S. 52 corridor is an area that Mendenhall wants to address.
He said he is glad to be back in Stanly County.
“Stanly County and Albemarle are special places, I want to grow with them,” Mendenhall said. “I am looking at this as a long-term outlook as the area grows.”
City service is important to Mendenhall.
“I want to be very responsive to internal and external customers,” he said. “I want to have a smooth dedicated process for economic growth and good quality of service to the citizens of Albemarle.”
Matt Irvin can be contacted at snaponline26@yahoo.c om
Copyright © 1999-2008 cnhi, inc.
Photos
Jon Mendenhall