John Thiel: New man at the helm of South Tahoe Public Utility District

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. - After Richard Solbrig told the South Tahoe Public Utility District (STPUD) Board of Directors he was retiring in January 2019 after 29 years with the agency the hunt was on for a new general manager.

It turned out they didn't have to look far.

John Thiel had been hired by Solbrig in 1992 as a staff engineer and he worked his way up through the ranks over the last 27 years until the Board chose him as the new general manager.

Hiring Thiel allowed the District to rely on the relationships he had been cultivating over the years both within the organization as well as those with other agencies such as Tahoe Regional Planning Agency, Lahontan Regional Water Quality Control Board, the City of South Lake Tahoe and El Dorado County.

Thiel is bringing his extensive civil engineering experience to the position along with his work in water reclamation. He's been part of implementing new wells, water lines, wastewater treatment improvements and the Alpine County Diamond Valley Ranch project.

"It's been a fantastic journey," said Thiel.

He also said he appreciates the team oriented staff and work family atmosphere at STPUD.

While he puts in long hours at the office, Thiel doesn't forget the home family.

"I love being a dad," said Thiel. "He's (son Andrew) the most important and beautiful thing in my life."

Andrew is now 24-years-old and over the last two-dozen years Thiel has been a Little League coach, scorekeeper and Pee Wee football coach. Outside of organized sports, Thiel enjoys skiing, snowboarding, hiking, trail running, boating and CrossFit training.

There are some challenges ahead for the new GM and STPUD. They'll be completing the mandated water meter installation and face an aging infrastructure without enough funds to fix everything.

"It's a big part of why I am here," Thiel said of his financial experience and bringing balance to the position as they complete necessary projects. He received his BS from Iowa and his Masters of Business Administration from the University of Nevada Reno.

As he gets settled into the new position, Thiel has three major goals for 2019:

1. Work in close partnership with the Board and community to balance their system needs with customer rates and capacity to implement improvements cost-effectively. Major project areas include:

Implementation of community-wide fire flow improvements. His goal is to see these completed over the next 10 years. About ten percent of the service area needs significant fire flow improvements.

Repair and replacement of aging water and sewer assets. STPUD has $1.5 billion in assets now in service. Obviously expensive to replace, Thiel says they must operate, maintain, repair and replace them effectively over time through comprehensive asset management programs. He wants to make sure they have a fully sustainable enterprise that stands the test of time, protects the environment, and provides safe drinking water for many generations to come.

His goal is to accelerate implementation of asset management programs to extend the useful life of assets and reduce short and long-term costs. Thiel said he is looking to leverage information technology to connect systems with people and analytics to make better decisions along the way – so STPUD is doing the right project, at the right time, in the right way.

2. Maintain and empower their high-performance workforce. He said they have a challenging mission in a highly sensitive environment and they must maintain a high-performance workforce. Providing water and sewer services is not glamorous, but if they fail – that can be catastrophic to the environment and can impart chaos into customer’s lives. Thiel is seeking the very highest levels of reliability and redundancy for the environment and for their customers.

Ongoing retirements require replacements: They are working hard to build their bench strength and build capacity from within the organization as much as possible with staff development and training programs, and other initiatives.

Maintain their dynamic culture and cultivate an atmosphere that empowers staff to work better together and create better results for the community. He said he wants to improve coordination and communication between departments and find more cost-effective solutions to our common challenges.

3. Evolve the District as a more visible and proactive community partner. Expand our existing relationships and work better and smarter for our community and our environment. This includes collaboration with the City, County, TRPA, Lahontan, Lake Valley, U.S. Forest Service, California Tahoe Conservancy and others, in search of funding and coordinated project and program development and implementation.

"I want our community to know that this is a public utility," said Thiel. "There is no stock, there are no shareholders, no profits to distribute. You are the owners. This is your system and you have a voice in what we do, how we do it, and where we are going."

The South Tahoe Public Utility Board meets twice a month, the first and third Thursday at 2:00 p.m. Meetings are held at the District office, located at 1275 Meadow Crest Drive, South Lake Tahoe.

The public is invited to attend a Meet & Greet with Thiel and the new South Lake Tahoe City Manager Frank Rush on Thursday, March 7 from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at South Lake Brewing Co., 1920 Lake Tahoe Blvd.