"Okay, fire. I give up. You win."

It was just a fleeting thought after exhaustion had set in from around-the-clock work during the Eaton and Palisades fire emergencies in January. As Los Angeles County Public Works Director Mark Pestrella crested a hill on his drive home toward Ventura County, Calif., he saw yet another out-of-control fire. Not only was he carrying the weight of the apocalyptic wildfires’ impact on Los Angeles communities, but also in his mind were memories of damage to his own family homes in two previous wildfires.

Fear. Doubt. Anger. These are “totally normal reactions, and when we can admit that, we can then begin to help others,” he told dozens of young engineers joining the department during an orientation meeting the next day. After that split-second intrusive thought about the fires, Pestrella said he re-steeled himself for the biggest crisis that LA has faced in the modern era. “I had to get my mind straight—to let go of the damage to my own home, to let go of what’s going on around me,” he noted, to channel all his energy into the recovery effort.

One could see on the faces of those young new recruits that Pestrella’s honesty and candor went a long way toward energizing and inspiring them, much like a general rallying his troops to battle. The weapons in this battle included hardhats, heavy equipment and lots of engineering know-how.

Serving more than 10 million people at the nation’s largest municipal public works agency, Pestrella leads a team of around 4,000 employees. The annual budget is $4.4 billion and the work involves managing hundreds of construction projects. As if that’s not enough, Pestrella and LA Public Works have partnered with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and other agencies to execute the fire cleanup, recovery and rebuild effort.

“When someone comes into an organization like Public Works, you need to know what’s expected of you. You need to know a little bit of the direction that the department is going, who we report to as far as the Board of Supervisors, and also our commitment to community,” says Angela George-Moody, chief deputy director at the agency. “He does that as part of his initial meetings with all employees who come into the organization. The feedback that we have received is ‘no one has ever done that for me before, told me what the guardrails are, told me what the goal post is.’ And director Pestrella really tries to do that.”

In a 38-year career dedicated to public service, the wildfires have become his career-defining event, Pestrella says. But in his day job, he also manages flood control and water resources, transportation infrastructure, environmental and municipal services, as well as construction management for a variety of entities.

And then there is everything he does for the next generation. “He dedicates an enormous amount of time in growing the future engineers and participating as a mentor to ensure that we have engineers that not only are technically capable, but also understand the impact they’re making on the public day-to-day,” says Stephanie Wiggins, CEO of the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (LA Metro).

Pestrella uses the same zeal for motivation in driving collaboration among many of the siloed agencies in LA County’s 88 municipalities, fusing their efforts in acquiring funding and getting big projects done.

For his passion to serve the public, his ability to foster interagency partnerships and his steadfast commitment to equity, sustainability and resilience, ENR’s editorial team selected Mark Pestrella to receive the Award of Excellence, its highest honor.

Pestrella monitors crews as they clean up debris flows after storms ravage fire-scarred soils.
Photo courtesy LA County Public Works

*Click on the photos for greater detail

Trial by Fire

Pestrella didn’t gravitate to civil engineering until college. Before then, he wanted to be a firefighter. He grew up in San Bernardino, Calif., with his parents and four sisters, at the edge of town along the urban-wilderness interface. While the location afforded many recreational opportunities—horseback riding, motorcycles, hiking—it also came with a hidden and deadly risk, one that revealed itself one particularly windy day when Pestrella was in high school.

“We noticed that there was smoke in the mountains above us, and it was making its way down the slopes,” he says. “I didn’t think much of it until an evacuation order came, and we were told ‘everyone stay at school!’ And of course, being the person I was, I didn’t. I don’t like being told what to do. I took off for home.”

Once he arrived, his neighborhood was ablaze, engulfed by the 1980 Panorama wildfire, started by an arsonist. “We lost our house despite what I thought was a valiant effort to save it at the time. Now, I think about how little I knew about fire, about how it works.” The incident “started a cycle of grieving that lasted quite a long time; you’re left with nothing, especially for a family that didn’t have a lot.”

While still overcoming his loss and anger, he headed off to Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo—the only one of his siblings to attend college—and landed on civil engineering due to his love of nature and earth sciences, and his ability to do math.

But it wasn’t until joining Public Works in 1987 that Pestrella began to understand both the importance of public service and “the effects of that fire on my life,” he says. “I started realizing, through a lot of different events, how important government is to people and how government actually had helped my family.” Working in the field for nine years for the county as a hydrologist, and then as a building official, Pestrella realized that having successful outcomes in solving problems required him to listen to what people’s needs were to understand the scope of the problem before entertaining solutions.

LA County Public Works controls a vast water supply and flood control system of 14 major dams, dozens of spreading grounds and hundreds of miles of stormwater conveyence channels. During last year’s rainy season alone, the agency captured and stored more than 96.3 billion gallons of stormwater.
Photos courtesy LA County Public Works
*Click on the photos for greater detail

“He’s never too busy when he’s talking to somebody, to a citizen, who’s got an issue. He’ll drop everything he’s doing to solve that problem,” says Zev Yaroslavsky, a former Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors member. “It’s because he’s been in that situation on the receiving end, and now he’s in the position where he can be on the giving end.”

But solving infrastructure challenges doesn’t often involve being in the limelight. “The other part of it is recognizing that there won’t be a ‘thank you’ at the end,” Pestrella says. “I just get great joy out of knowing that we’re making a difference in people’s lives every day, and whether they know it or not is really secondary.”

(Clockwise from bottom) Pestrella, an avid surfer, does some of his most creative thinking while on the board; Pestrella’s grandfather, who was the last lighthouse operator on the easternmost tip of the Hawaiian Islands, instilled public service values early on; Pestrella sworn in as director in 2017; lifelong Dodgers fan Pestrella poses with sportscaster Vin Scully.
Photos courtesy Mark Pestrella

Retired Public Works deputy director Carl Blum remembers when Pestrella first came to work under him in the 1980s. “He was a very sharp young man,” he says. “He moved up in the organization—unfortunately for me, they saw his talents and moved him elsewhere.” But Blum became an advisor and mentor to Pestrella as he worked up the chain of command. “They put him in a very sensitive political area, and that’s, I think, where he learned a lot of his skills on how to work with politicians and how to work with sensitive communities.”

While Blum retired from the agency in 2000, Pestrella continued to chip away at the region’s drought and water resilience issues as president of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) Los Angeles chapter. During that time in the early 2000s, little future proofing could be done because the 88 municipalities and more than 200 water supply agencies lacked cohesion. “Everybody was in their own silos. Everybody’s competing for the same money. There was absolutely no incentive to cooperate on anything,” Blum says. During visioning symposiums, water experts identified the need for a long-term funding source via a ballot measure, coupled with a robust public education effort and strong leadership, he adds.

The political will for a ballot measure fizzled after the 2008 recession, but in the meantime Pestrella moved up the ranks, and in 2017 was appointed director. Blum, says Pestrella “became the guy carrying the torch to pursue this long-term paradigm shift that had to take place” to get buy-in from both the public and politicians for Measure W, which would provide around $300 million annually to capture, clean and conserve billions of gallons of stormwater, modernize water system infrastructure and enhance green spaces.

In 2018, Measure W passed with nearly 70% of the vote. “And built into that program was collaboration,” with a scoring system that gave bonus points for interagency projects, Blum adds.

Since then, numerous infrastructure upgrades have been made and an overall LA County Water Plan was adopted in 2023 that focuses on reliability, groundwater management, equity and watershed management, and better aligns those goals with state and federal funding, Pestrella says. Through these various efforts, by the end of last year’s rainy season, Public Works had captured and stored more than 96.3 billion gallons of stormwater via the county’s 14 major dams and more than two dozen spreading grounds facilities.

The 51-mile LA River flood control system, which protects the metro area from stormwater but disconnects many neighborhoods, became another political football. The 1950s-era system is “a marvel of engineering, but not a marvel of partnership with the community,” Yaroslavsky says.

Multiple schemes had been floated over the decades as environmentalists and communities clamored for a better solution than the concrete-lined eyesore. But finally, a plan developed by Public Works under Pestrella’s guidance after numerous community meetings gained approval by the Board of Supervisors in mid-2022. The plan will restore portions of the natural waterway and add parks, trails, community centers and other amenities.

“It’s an iconic project that’s ongoing right now, and the relationships with all the parties,” including the LA Dept. of Water and Power and the Corps “has really made all the difference in whether or not we get off the ground,” Pestrella says.

In everything he does, Pestrella has the public, whom he considers his customers, in mind. To better serve them, Pestrella says he’s applied elements from the private sector in structuring his public agency to motivate staff and solve problems. “If you look at the outcomes we’ve had, they’ve been pretty tremendous,” he says. “It empowers people to have courage to go the extra mile and make decisions.”

 

Wave of Inspiration

Colleagues note that while Pestrella has a voracious work ethic, especially during emergency situations such as the fires or recent floods, he also has another side. “Mark is working all day long and halfway through the night—I don’t know when he sleeps—but I can tell you, if he wasn’t at work, he’d be in a pair of bathing trunks and he’d have a surfbord at the beach,” says Martin Adams, retired general manager and chief engineer at the LA Dept. of Water and Power. “Unknown to everybody else, Mark is a total beach bum and loves the outdoors.”

It was in that idyllic setting that Pestrella in 2021 envisioned a way to do a deeper dive into collaboration with other LA agencies by forming a new group.

“InfrastructureLA came to me, where most of my big ideas come for me, either sitting on the back of my truck looking at the ocean, or sitting on a surfboard out in the water,” Pestrella says. With the potential for funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill, which had not yet been passed at that point, he foresaw the need for ways to prioritize and share efforts to procure funding for needed infrastructure.

Pestrella pitched the idea to Adams, LA Metro’s Wiggins and the head of LA County Sanitation Districts during a dinner, who all agreed to form InfrastructureLA, a voluntary cooperative non-political group to foster common goals and solutions.

“Together, we were able to identify where the greatest burdens in LA County are on our community due to our infrastructure, and where the greatest benefits might occur,” Pestrella says. “We put a framework over our prioritization that included equity. And with that equity framework, we are able to identify where is the biggest bang for our buck” to benefit communities economically and from a health perspective.

Around 4,000 employees perform numerous disparate tasks, from managing megaprojects such as the $1.7-billion Harbor-UCLA Medical Center Replacement Program (top) to handling permitting, transportation (right) and other municipal services for unincorporated county areas such as Altadena.
Photos courtesy LA County Public Works

“In just a few short years, InfrastructureLA has already begun to reap benefits,” Wiggins says. She cites “improved coordination and collaboration” on the 14.5-mi Southeast Gateway light-rail line, “identifying solutions to advance that project through the environmental process.” Another example was when InfrastructureLA members provided “letters of support for grant applications for projects of regional significance, like on our 710 Reimagining Program” which provides mobility improvements—instead of more freeway lanes—between Alhambra and Pasadena.

“Mark had a vision centered around fostering collaboration across the region, bringing together stakeholders, cities, businesses and the largest infrastructure players in LA County,” adds Wiggins. “Prior to that, we were pretty much siloed in our approach. Because of his vision, we’re now at the table together, collaborating, identifying solutions to some of our biggest infrastructure challenges today.”

InfrastructureLA has brought more than $2 billion in funding to the region, says Public Works’ George-Moody. “Some of the projects are associated with energy improvements and others with greenhouse gas, so we’ve been able to leverage quite a bit of funding throughout the region that will support a lot of the resiliency and sustainability projects that are proposed for the upcoming years.”

Adams says Pestrella was also the driving force in getting signatories for the Equity in Infrastructure Project pledge, designed to ensure inclusive procurements that boost engagement with small and local businesses to execute the mounting infrastructure work needed for reconstruction and to prepare for the 2028 Olympics.

Winter storms brought flooding and created debris flows through fire-damaged regions, requiring further remediation (left). Public Works crews in Altadena (right) repair critical infrastructure to allow residents back into their properties.  
Photos courtesy LA County Public Works

At an event produced by ENR for InfrastructureLA in 2023, 14 of the region’s biggest public-private infrastructure entities, from LA Metro to Los Angeles World Airports to AECOM, signed the pledge.

“It’s never about him, but he has been the glue that has brought so many agencies together,” Adams says. “You need someone who’s a champion of bringing together people as a team, creating that camaraderie and that working spirit. Mark represents that every single day.”

Other regions have begun to emulate InfrastructureLA’s formula. Terri Mestas, former Los Angeles World Airports chief development officer and group representative, joined Seattle’s Sound Transit in 2024 as deputy CEO for megaproject delivery, managing about $54 billion in future infrastructure work. “I was so excited about the work we did at InfrastructureLA that I pitched the idea to the Port [of Washington] and to WSDOT [Washington State Dept. of Transportation] … and they said, ‘we’re all in. Let’s figure out how we can get this done,’” she says.

Pestrella also extends his advocacy for public service to the broader industry. “Mark is deeply committed to collaboration, sustainability, community service and advancing the profession. He’s a longstanding member of ASCE and a variety of other professional societies, and he’s not a passive member,” says Tom Smith, ASCE national executive director. “He serves on boards. He chairs committees. He’s always striving for collaboration, and he’s really doing a lot of the frontline work.”

In 2021, crews fast-tracked a new Mulholland Highway Bridge to replace one destroyed in the 2018 Woolsey Fire.
Photo courtesy LA County Public Works

Pestrella currently chairs ASCE’s Industry Leaders Council, which Smith describes as a “team of 30 senior leaders from industry, academia and government that identify emerging industry challenges and trends impacting civil engineering, as well as innovative approaches and solutions to these challenges. Under Mark’s leadership, the [council] partners with ASCE to drive change in the industry and the profession on a global basis.” [Editor's note: ENR’s Blair serves on the council.]

Last November, Pestrella was again tried by fire, this time in the home where he lives with his wife and two sons in Ventura County during the Mountain Fire. He barely saved it from being totally burned down by staying behind to fight the flames with one of his sons. But heavy damage required the family to move out for a year-long remodel.

“I’m currently a participant, an observer and [responding to] a fire incident,” says Pestrella, an unfortunate “trifecta” that he shares with many local residents. “It’s something that we all recognize as a great stress.”

But just days after the November fire, Pestrella was not only working around the clock at Public Works helping others in need, he also hosted a previously scheduled ILC visioning symposium in his offices. “Mark chaired the full two-day meeting with a deep commitment to evaluate the current state of America’s infrastructure, and to identify and recommend a set of top priorities to ASCE Board of Direction to advance over the coming year and beyond,” Smith says.

But the biggest focus for Pestrella now remains the recovery and rebuild from January’s fires, which he is leading with the Army Corps and local entities.

About a week after the fires started, Army Corps Major General Kimberly M. Colloton met with Pestrella to “ better understand, from his perspective, the LA County roles, responsibilities and plans” at the same time the Corps was assessing what its role would be in the recovery. “Mark absolutely is a trusted partner, and knowing firsthand from Mark how he saw the situation unfolding and where he felt he needed assistance really helped me set the foundation for informing the rest of the team members that we would eventually bring on.”

Major General Jason E. Kelly, who is now leading the cleanup effort for the Corps, says that by working together with Pestrella and Public Works, “we enhance resilience, improve infrastructure and serve communities with a shared commitment to innovation and public safety.”

The Corps is managing removal of 4.5 million tons of debris from the 9,000 individual properties in the Eaton Fire area and 6,000 lots in Palisades. Public Works, as the building official for Altadena and unincorporated areas, in partnership with LA and Malibu, will set standards for the reconstruction.

Pestrella also used his connections to “invite both private and public utilities to come in to talk about how we’re going to rebuild these areas, and do it in a resilient, modern way,” he says. “It’s our chance to correct a lot of the really poor utility construction from the past.”

Photos courtesy LA County Public Works
*Click on the photos for greater detail

But, “the challenges are vast,” he adds. “For those in the industry that haven’t seen this, I challenge you to come and understand the scale.”

At the partnering meetings, “I’ve seen Mark’s attributes as a leader, where he leans into the trust and respect that people have for him,” says Maryam Brown, CEO of SoCalGas, the nation’s largest natural gas distribution utility. During one such meeting, Pestrella emphasized that the fires were a career event for many working in public service. “The message that he was delivering was that ‘you all have young people that report to you. They’re watching you. They’re watching how it is that you manage this fire, and that’s going to shape them for the rest of their careers … because they’re going to be in your shoes one day,’” Brown says.

As Pestrella looks toward a future where he passes the torch to Public Works’ next leader, he intends to bake in collaboration and partnering to the agency structure. He also hopes to ingrain in the next generation his philosophy of public service.

“What did I do today or what am I going to do tomorrow that no one will know about, that will save someone’s life or improve their lives?” he asks himself. “All we have in our life is time. Somewhere along the line, that’s going to end for me, so I’m trying to get as many of those lives saved as I can before I walk out of here.”