Wastewater Project Planning and Delivery Section Manager

King County; Seattle (WA); Hybrid; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Hybrid work model

Equal opportunity employer

Job summary

King County is seeking a Section Manager for Project Planning & Delivery to lead a multi-unit team responsible for planning, design, and delivery of the wastewater capital program. The role drives governance, budgeting, risk management, and regulatory alignment across a large portfolio to ensure safe, reliable infrastructure.

The position emphasizes collaboration with Operations & Maintenance, Finance, and external partners, with a hybrid work model and strong focus on equity and continuous

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in engineering, construction management, project management, planning, or related field.
• Advanced supervisory skills in a technical and political environment.
• Advanced knowledge of capital project planning, budgeting, and strategy.
• Experience with public utility finance and budgeting techniques.
• Knowledge of project planning, construction, and contract administration.
• Understanding of legislative processes and working with officials and regulators.
• Ability to assess risks and manage crises to protect public health and safety.
• Skill in coordinating resources across multiple disciplines and programs.
• Ability to evaluate information and make decisions with limited documentation.
• Negotiation skills balancing division and county interests within constraints.
• Excellent communication for technical information to non-technical audiences.
• Team-building and conflict resolution capabilities.

Responsibilities

• Support the division director in implementing goals and performance measures.
• Oversee unit managers responsible for design, construction, and planning services.
• Serve as a strategic advisor to senior management and regulatory partners.
• Develop and maintain standards, policies, procedures for planning and project management.
• Develop and manage the section budget and allocate resources.
• Handle HR duties including hiring, training and evaluations.
• Support county-wide initiatives and equity, social justice considerations in the capital program.

Skills

Strategic leadership

Budget management

Risk management

Executive communication

Team development

Policy interpretation

Education

Bachelor’s degree in engineering / related field

Tools

PRISM

Microsoft Excel

Forecasting software

Job description

About the Role

The Section Manager for Project Planning & Delivery (PPD) holds a uniquely pivotal leadership role within WTD, one that spans the entire lifecycle of capital delivery and connects long-term system strategies to day-to-day implementation. This role stewards how WTD plans, designs, builds, and hands over major infrastructure investments, guiding work that begins with long-range system planning and continues through design, portfolio, program and project management, asset management, construction, and ultimately handover to Operations. Because WTD’s capital program is both multi-billion-dollar and essential to regional public health and environmental protection, the PPD Section Manager serves as the integrator who ensures that capital delivery is strategic, risk-informed, technically sound, and aligned with regulatory and financial commitments. The role’s reach across eight specialized units, along with its close partnership with Operations and Maintenance, Finance, Environmental and Community Services, and countywide agencies, makes it central to how WTD delivers reliable and sustainable infrastructure for the region.

As a member of the Division Leadership Team, the PPD Section Manager ensures that WTD’s capital delivery system operates with disciplined and risk-informed execution. The role guides how capital governance functions, how risks and system needs are surfaced, and how decision-ready information supports regulatory and financial commitments. This leadership ensures that long-range strategy is translated into clear and predictable delivery practices across the division.

The Section Manager leads more than 400 professional staff across eight specialized units that collectively deliver WTD’s multi-billion-dollar capital portfolio. The role provides direction, coordination, and integration across these units, ensuring consistent practices, strong technical foundations, and reliable project outcomes. Close partnership with Operations and Maintenance, Finance, Environmental and Community Services, and countywide agencies ensures that capital delivery aligns with system performance, community expectations, and long-term stewardship.

The PPD Section Manager also strengthens WTD’s capital delivery system by advancing quality, governance, workforce readiness, and continuous improvement. The role supports supervisors, develops people and teams, and reinforces a culture where safety, equity, collaboration, and accountability are core to how work gets done. This stewardship ensures that WTD’s capital delivery capabilities evolve with the complexity of the system and the needs of the region.

Equally important, the Section Manager must be able to lead within the ambiguity of a changing environment. This requires visioning for the future, integrating evolving regulatory requirements into a working utility, championing diverse strategies for capital delivery — including collaborative delivery methodologies — and implementing programmatic efficiencies across a complex portfolio of utility needs. This is a transformational time for WTD.

As WTD launches our Vision for Clean Water, shaped by staff and community input, to guide the Regional Wastewater Services Plan update. We are advancing projects to serve the next generation, meeting the moment with cost-optimization workshops and expanded engagement to develop a two-year sewer rate that offers greater predictability for ratepayers. The decisions and work of staff today are setting the course for our region for years to come.

At the same time, we continue the essential day-to-day work of operating 24/7, maintaining an aging system, and navigating complex regulatory processes. None of this is easy or straightforward. Yet time and again, WTD turns challenges into opportunities — bringing creativity to our work, sparking new possibilities, and reinforcing the resilience of our capital delivery system.

The duties and responsibilities described above are intended to provide a general framework for this position and may be modified, expanded or reassigned as organizational priorities, programs or operational needs evolve.

This position follows a hybrid work model, blending remote and in-person work.

About the Team

Our Project Planning & Delivery team brings together a diverse group of specialized units that work collaboratively to plan, design, manage, and deliver critical infrastructure for our region. Together, we ensure that capital investments are strategic, technically sound, regulatory-compliant, and executed with consistency, transparency, and long-term stewardship in mind. The following units make up this integrated team:

• Portfolio Planning & Analysis (PPA) – Provides long-range capital planning, portfolio governance, and project prioritization to align capital needs with WTD’s strategic, regulatory, and financial goals. The unit develops the six-year CIP and provides decision-ready analysis that guides capital investment choices across the division.
• Planning, Inspection, Modeling, Mapping & Monitoring (PIM3) – Provides comprehensive, long-term system planning needed for capacity planning, regulatory compliance, and risk-based capital decisions, supported by condition assessment, hydraulic modeling, mapping, and monitoring.
• Engineering & Technical Resources (ETR) – Provides design and wastewater systems engineering, technical standards, and design oversight to ensure quality and constructability. The unit delivers emergency-response engineering, leads structured Local Public Agency coordination, and provides facility record-drawing support.
• Program/Project Management Unit (PMU) – Manages project delivery from initiation through closeout, ensuring scope, schedule, budget, and risk expectations are met. The unit coordinates stakeholders and project teams to deliver predictable, high-quality capital outcomes. PMU’s Asset Management group guides lifecycle planning, risk-based prioritization, and long-term stewardship of WTD infrastructure.
• Project Controls (PC) – Oversees cost estimating, scheduling, reporting, and risk analysis in partnership with project delivery teams to support consistent and transparent project delivery. The unit provides scope, schedule, and budget performance information into WTD’s Project Information (PRISM) data-management system of record to strengthen accountability and inform leadership decisions.
• CSO Regulatory Unit (CSO) – Delivers CSO projects and coordinates with Ecology and regional partners to ensure capital investments, including complex regulatory mega projects, meet consent decree and permit requirements. CSO facilities treat stormwater and wastewater that exceed pipe capacity in older parts of Seattle during heavy rain. This unit focuses on projects driven by regulatory obligations not addressed in other portfolios, evaluating compliance along with timing, sequencing, and the cost and risk of non-compliance.
• Construction Management (CM) – Provides field oversight, inspection, and contractor coordination to ensure safe, high-quality construction. Confirms adherence to contract requirements and resolves field issues to keep projects on track.
• Capital Strategy, Quality & Standards (CSQS) – Leads capital delivery governance, quality management, and standards development across PPD. Drives continuous improvement to strengthen consistency, efficiency, and readiness across all units.

Join our team dedicated to ensuring clean water for generations to come! With over 1000 employees engaged in planning, designing, building, and operating treatment facilities, our agency is at the forefront of environmental stewardship. Success for us means upholding our legacy while promising future generations a pristine environment.

We partner with regulatory agencies to reduce harmful waste discharge and actively educate the public and businesses on water quality protection. We prioritize accountability to our ratepayers and operate a well-managed agency that services over 2.3 million King County residents. Our regional wastewater treatment system not only sustains a healthy environment but also fuels economic development, fostering prosperity in our region. If you're passionate about making a difference and thrive in a collaborative environment, join us in our mission to safeguard our precious water resources.

Commitment to Equity, Racial and Social Justice

King County, named after Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., is a diverse and vibrant community that represents cultures from around the world. We prioritize equity, racial and social justice, making it a foundational and daily expectation for all employees. As a Wastewater Project Planning and Delivery Section Manager, you will actively apply these principles in all aspects of your work. Learn more about our commitment at http://www.kingcounty.gov/equity.

What You Will Be Doing

• Support the division director and other section managers to develop and implement the division's improvement measures and annual goals and objectives. Develop performance measures and standards for work units within the section including performance standards for unit managers, technical, professional and administrative staff.
• Oversee and direct the work of unit managers responsible for a wide variety of design, construction and planning services that provides regional wastewater treatment and resource recovery systems.
• Serve on Wastewater Treatment Division's senior management team. Provide strategic direction and guidance on regional wastewater treatment and resource recovery system and act as a key advisor on strategic and policy issues. Serve as high level agency representative with top levels of management at local, federal and state regulatory agencies.
• Develop, implement, and maintain standards, policies and procedures for all planning, engineering and project management related work for the division. Develop, implement, and maintain a comprehensive planning project to support operating and capital projects. Develop, implement, and maintain a comprehensive asset management program for the division.
• Develop the section bi-annual budget, allocate resources and budget for assigned projects and monitor expenditures to stay within established guidelines. Develop, implement and maintain innovative staffing models to insure that all operating and capital projects are completed on time and within budget.
• Perform the full scope of human resources responsibilities including hiring, training, performance evaluations and recommending disciplinary actions for assigned staff and subordinates.
• Provide support to County-wide initiatives and programs such as developing capital systems County-wide, ensuring ESJ elements are considered in the Divisions' capital program.

Qualifications You Bring

• Bachelor's degree in engineering, construction management, project management, planning, or a closely related field, or, an equivalent combination of education and experience.
• Demonstrated advanced experience and knowledge in supervisory techniques and principles in a highly technical and political environment.
• Advanced knowledge of capital project and strategic planning techniques and principles and the application of this knowledge to establish the direction and make decisions regarding multiple competing internal and external programs or projects.
• Advanced knowledge of public utility finance, budgeting techniques and principles.
• Advanced knowledge of project planning and management, construction, project control, and contract administration techniques and principles.
• Knowledge of engineering techniques and principles.
• Understanding of legislative process and skill in working with elected officials, regulatory agency representatives and the general public.
• Demonstrated skill in assessing risks and establishing means to mitigate risks. Ability to quickly assess problems during crises and make decisions to protect the public and employees' health and safety and mitigate property damages and costs.
• Demonstrated skill in assessing and determining the necessary resources to successfully complete work programs with multiple technical disciplines, regulatory agencies and the community.
• Demonstrated skill in evaluating information to make decisions within and outside of established guidelines with limited documentation.
• Skill in negotiating and identifying solutions that balance the division's and the County's interests and those of the negotiating partner(s) within financial capacity and other constraints.
• Excellent communication skills to communicate technical information to non-technical audiences.
• Demonstrated skill in conflict resolution techniques and principles.
• Team building techniques and principles and demonstrated skill in working with others in achieving common goals and objectives.

Competencies You Bring

• Strategic Mindset: Seeing ahead to future possibilities and translating them into breakthrough strategies.
• Communicates Effectively: Developing and delivering multi-mode communications that convey a clear understanding of the unique needs of different audiences.
• Ensures Accountability: Holding self and others accountable to meet commitments.
• Courage: Stepping up to address difficult issues, saying what needs to be said.
• Decision Quality: Making good and timely decisions that keep the organization moving forward.

Required Licenses/Certifications

• A Valid Washington State Driver's License

Working Conditions

Work Location: The Project Planning and Delivery team works in a hybrid model, with days in the office as well as telecommuting. The ratio of remote to onsite work will be dependent on business needs and is subject to change. The primary onsite location is 201 S. Jackson Street, Seattle, WA. Employees must reside in Washington state and within a reasonable distance to their King County worksite to respond to workplace reporting requirements. King County has a robust collection of tools and resources to support working remotely. The individual selected for this opportunity will join an innovative and progressive team that is redefining how we work as we transition to the department's hybrid environment. Employees will be provided with a County-issued laptop and must maintain a home workspace with an internet connection where they can reliably perform work and remain available and responsive during scheduled work hours.

Work Schedule: This full-time position works a 40-hour work week. This position is exempt from the overtime provision of the Fair Labor Standard Act (FLSA) and is not overtime eligible.

Union Representation: Teamsters Local 117 – Wastewater Treatment Division, Managers and Assistant Managers. Salary reflects $2.00 per hour contribution to the Western Conference of Teamsters Pension Trust.

King County is an Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Employer

No person is unlawfully excluded from employment opportunities based on sex, race, color, national origin, ethnicity, religious affiliation, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age except by minimum age and retirement provisions, pregnancy, status as a family caregiver, parental status, marital status, military status or status as a veteran who was honorably discharged or who was discharged solely as a result of the person's sexual orientation or gender identity or expression, citizenship or immigration status, genetic information, or other protected class. However, to the extent that distinction or differential treatment on the basis of citizenship or immigration status is authorized by either federal or state law, regulation, or government contract, it is not an unfair practice.

Our EEO policy applies to all employment actions, including but not limited to recruitment, hiring, selection for training, promotion, transfer, demotion, layoff, termination, rates of pay or other forms of compensation.