Civil & Environmental Consultants Inc. provides civil and site development engineering, environmental compliance and permitting, waste management, ecological and water resources.

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At the heart of Civil & Environmental Consultants Inc. (CEC) are three values that CEO Greg Quatchak says define the firm. When he and the other three founding principals established the firm in 1989, those values were its guiding lights.

“We really focused the firm around three core values: senior leadership, integrated services and personal relationships with our clients,” he says.

Based in Pittsburgh, CEC provides services such as civil and site development engineering, environmental compliance and permitting, waste management, ecological and water resources.

Clients include real estate developers, architects, waste management firms, law offices and private-sector companies. The company also has offices in Detroit; Chicago; Nashville; Cleveland; Indianapolis; St. Louis; Cincinnati; Columbus, Ohio; and Export, Pa.

Those values continue to serve as the center of the company, even as it continues to grow. In 2007, CEC had its best year ever in terms of revenues, posting results of $55 million.

Still, Quatchak says, CEC is still a relatively small firm and continues to add new capabilities and services. As the firm grows larger, however, the core values that it was founded on will continue to influence it, he says.

The Whole Package
Bringing together as many services as possible is one of CEC’s bedrock principles, and Quatchak says that is exactly what the firm does. “For a small firm, we’re really unique in the overall scope of services that we provide,” he says.

Aside from architecture, CEC provides consulting for practically all areas related to the exterior of a building, Quatchak says.

These include geotechnical engineering, landscape architecture, surveying, civil engineering/land development, construction management and structural engineering. The company’s ecological services include permit negotiation and environmental reporting, while environmental services such as site selection and due diligence are also offered.

CEC’s services for waste management include site selection and design of waste facilities and transfer stations.

Recently, Quatchak says, the firm added water resource services such as water and wastewater treatment, watershed planning, and stormwater BMP testing. He says the company’s ecological services include a fleet of boats in Pittsburgh to conduct surveys of endangered mussel species.

“One of the things we hear over and over from new clients is that it’s refreshing to have all of these services under one company,” Quatchak says.

Along with expanding into water resource services, Quatchak says, CEC is seeing growth opportunities in sustainable development.

“We’re fortunate to be in Pittsburgh,” he says. “Pittsburgh is one of the leading green cities in the country, believe it or not.” The city is in constant competition with Austin, Texas and Portland, Oregon for the highest number of LEED-certified buildings, he says.

“[Green] is a real culture in our headquarters here in Pittsburgh,” Quatchak says. More than a dozen of the firm’s staff members are currently studying for LEED-accredited professional status, and the company made sure that its recently expanded 100,000-square-foot headquarters would receive LEED certification, he adds.

Green building has become such a way of life to CEC and its clients that Quatchak says part of the firm’s strategic plan is to eventually develop a new core practice in sustainability.

“I can honestly say that in the projects we’re involved with in the Pittsburgh area now, it’s always part of the project objectives,” he says.

Filling the Think Tank
There’s a common complaint among technically inclined firms these days, and CEC is no stranger to it: the lack of qualified engineers and technical personnel.

“One of the biggest challenges we have is people – finding good, qualified people to work for our organization,” Quatchak says. “The market is so tight right now that you have some people doing some desperate things.”

He says raiding other firms for talent has become increasingly common among the competition.

Fewer qualified graduates are coming out of engineering schools, Quatchak says, which is doubly distressing for CEC because of the nature of its work. He says consulting engineers need to be “the cream of the crop” because of the complex issues they encounter in their everyday projects. “If you’re a consulting engineer, you’re getting the most difficult problems to solve,” Quatchak says.

The long-term solution to the problem, he continues, is one that the entire industry must take up as its own responsibility. He says the problem is too large and pervasive to be handled effectively by one firm. “If anything, the engineering and consulting profession has to do a better job of getting kids interested in science,” Quatchak says.

In some of the areas in which CEC operates, such as Nashville, the situation is especially bad. To take some of the pressure off CEC and give it room to focus on its core business, it hired a full-time internal recruiter, Quatchak says.

As for retaining current staff, Quatchak says CEC follows to a policy of professionally development staff and promoting from within. “One of the things that this firm has grown on is a model we call a ‘do-manage-market-lead’ model,” Quatchak says.  

The model is actually a career path that develops technical staff into project managers, marketers, and ultimately into leaders of the firm.  Quatchak says this approach to professional career development demonstrates the value CEC places on its employees.

Building Pittsburgh
Two current projects in Pittsburgh show off just how far CEC has come since its inception – a corporate nuclear energy campus for Westinghouse in Cranberry Township, a northern suburb of Pittsburgh, and the new home of the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Quatchak says CEC helped evaluate and plan the site in Cranberry for Westinghouse’s 800,000-square-foot headquarters campus, which is currently under construction.

Quatchak says the new complex was instrumental in Westinghouse remaining in the Pittsburgh area. “It’s really putting Pittsburgh on the map as the potential nuclear engineering capital of the world,” he says.

CEC also helped survey and demolish the site for the new $290 million arena for the Pittsburgh Penguins.

The arena was the deciding factor in keeping the team from relocating to a new market. CEC was retained by architect HOK Sport to provide civil engineering and site development. Quatchak says the arena will break ground later this year and be ready for the 2010-2011 NHL season.

Even though Quatchak says CEC is slightly concerned about the overall national economy, there’s still enough work to keep the firm busy.

The Columbus office in particular has been affected by the housing crisis, but Quatchak says it hasn’t been enough to put a damper on the entire company. “The rest of our offices are still staying pretty busy,” he says.