Tom Neisler named water district manager

At the end of a marathon 2 p.m. to 7 p.m. closed meeting on Fri., Aug. 26, the Tehachapi-Cummings County Water District board of directors selected district Assistant General Manager Tom Neisler to succeed General Manager John Martin, who is retiring in November.

Neisler was one of 30 candidates for the job. He will be the fourth general manager in the 51-year history of the district, following engineer Bob Jasper, surveyor Glen Mueller and public administrator Martin.

The Bear Valley Springs resident joined the water district in 2013 as operations manager and was named assistant general manager in 2015.

As the operations chief, Neisler has been tasked with ensuring that the powerful engines in the district’s string of pump plants keep pushing State Project Water 3,150 feet up the hill from the San Joaquin (Central) Valley floor to the Tehachapi valleys.

“I’m an operations junkie,” he told Forde Files. “I am passionate about this stuff. I want to get to details.”

Born and raised in Chicago, Neisler, 56, has been a consulting engineer and heavy engineering project manager for Guinn Engineering, working on wind, solar and other multi-million dollar projects. Prior to Guinn, he was Supervisor of Public Works for the Bear Valley Community Services District for six years.

“I have seen what is done at every point on the spectrum – designing, building and working as a builder’s representative,” he said. “It has given me a unique perspective.”

When he was in high school he worked in his stepfather’s engineering office, where he learned technical drafting. He studied civil engineering at San Diego State University. He holds a California state board Water Distribution license and is a professional land surveyor.

In the future, the water district will require considerable statewide outreach and inevitable political lobbying. While Neisler does not foresee any major changes in the operation of the district, he said there are three challenges that must be addressed:

Guaranteed water supply – The primary source of water for the Tehachapi valleys is the State Water Project (SWP), whose supply is variable and subject to political whims as well as the northern California snowpack. The Twin tunnels project in the Sacramento Delta, known as the California Water Fix, he said, “will be a huge component in guaranteeing the water supply in the future.” To stay on top of the project and stay informed, representatives of the district will be obliged to travel to meetings all over the state. Neisler said that the district is 0.5 percent (1/2 of one percent) of the SWP. Los Angeles Metro is 50 percent and the Kern County Water Agency is 25 percent (“We are 2 percent of that 25 percent, but it is 100 percent for us and 100 percent important for our customers.”)

Infrastructure – The water delivery system for the Tehachapi-Cummings County Water District was built out 50 years ago. “It’s all aged at the same rate. It’s all the same vintage. The useful life is 50 to 75 years,” he said. “The board has had the foresight to complete a $7 million engine replacement project and we are embarking on a pipeline assessment. So far, seven miles of pipelines are being tested from the Edmonston pumping plant at the San Joaquin Valley to the district’s pump plant 1. The district, as Watermaster, also has embarked on a review of the safe yield (how much water can be removed without depleting the underground basin) in Cummings Valley and is working with customers “to cooperatively change their use patterns to meet the new safe yield.” (The old safe yield figure was 4,090 acre feet a year; a new study shows it to be 1/3 less, at 2,990 acre feet a year).

Bring in younger workers – “The district is a desirable place to work and our employees have long tenure – the average exceeds 20 years. The workforce is getting older. The youngest guy in the pump plant department is in his late 40s.” There is considerable competition for workers to fill the heavy duty mechanic and pipeline technician jobs, which pay well and have good public sector benefit plans. See the district web site for information, tccwd.com.

The district board is Watermaster for three basins – Tehachapi, Brite Valley and Cummings Valley.

“What we do is unknown and underappreciated,” Neisler said. “Without the district the Tehachapi area would look different – there would be no golf courses, less agriculture and the population would be less.”

Neisler and his wife Carolyn, a photographer and avid hiker (50 miles a week), have four children and eight grandchildren. She is office administrator for the Bear Valley Church (non-denominational evangelical) and he is taking a one-year sabbatical from his latest four-year tenure on the church’s Elder Board.

They like to travel and love museums, his favorite being the Louvre in Paris. He’s a bicyclist and currently is reading the classic 1880 book “Ben Hur.”