Summary
As the only county in the United States named after Martin Luther King, Jr., King County is a vibrant community with residents who represent countries from around the world. It is a region with increasing diversity that cherishes the artistic and social traditions of many cultures. Together, we're changing the way government delivers service and winning national recognition as a model of excellence.
We continue to build on an enduring legacy of shared values of equity and social justice, employee engagement, innovative thinking, and continuous improvement. With this commitment, King County has adopted a pro-equity agenda aimed at advancing regional change and is developing the systems and standards necessary to achieve better outcomes for all of our residents, regardless of their race or income. All these qualities make this King County one of the nation's best places to live, work, and play.
King County is changing the way we work—improving performance, processes, and service delivery to increase equity and respond to our region's changing needs.
The Executive Climate Office is looking to fill one (1) Embodied Carbon Program Manager position to support implementation of a recently awarded $50M EPA Climate Pollution Reduction Grant.
About the Role:
This role is crucial for supporting the implementation of key building decarbonization and clean energy programs at King County. The Embodied Carbon Program Manager will design and manage a grant-funded program to decarbonize community and public buildings across Puget Sound in collaboration with other regional and local government agencies. This program is funded by the King County’s Climate Pollution Reduction Grant (CPRG) award from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which provides $50 million in funds over the next five years for multiple programs across four counties (Kitsap, King, Pierce, and Snohomish). The Embodied Carbon Program will focus on activities in King County and potential collaboration with cities in King County and may also include opportunities to collaborate with staff from other counties. This role will design and deploy an embodied carbon program for government capital projects and develop embodied carbon building codes for commercial and multifamily construction projects. This role will also track deliverables and outcomes to support timely reporting to the EPA and program partners.
The position will report to senior staff in the Executive Climate Office (ECO). The role will work actively with a team of people working to implement the CPRG grant and other programs in ECO and with partner jurisdictions.
The ideal candidate will have strong experience working on embodied carbon programs, capital project experience, working with multiple government departments, managing consultant contracts, and familiarity with building codes. ECO is seeking a self-starter who is skilled at building relationships with a broad range of policy and technical staff, consultants, and developers – and who is comfortable with developing collaborative solutions in the face of emerging opportunities.
ABOUT THE OFFICE
King County established the Executive Climate Office (ECO) to elevate and accelerate Executive Constantine and the County’s commitment, coordination, and ability to deliver on climate action internally and in collaboration with cities and partners. Since being established in 2023, the Executive Climate Office has grown to over 20 staff, fellows, and interns, and has secured over $60M in state and federal grants.
Job Duties
- Establish the embodied carbon capital program for King County projects, including Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) requirements; Global Warming Potential (GWP) limits; capital project benchmarking and procurement policy; and helping develop construction contract and material specifications as applicable.
- Establish codes to phase-in embodied carbon requirements for private commercial and multifamily construction projects, by developing an ordinance to amend local code building codes, and potentially developing, following and supporting state building code amendments.
- Help design and lead workshops on program development for different interested parties, including developers, code writers, community members, staff and leadership.
- Manage the program budget as well as consultant contracts supporting the program, including tracking contract requirements, performance, deliverables, and invoicing.
- To advance program outcomes, work with:
- Community, community-based organizations, advocates, and local government staff to apply an equity lens and advance outcomes for frontline communities in program deliverables, including but not limited to the below.
- Program impacts on small, women- and minority-owned businesses and potential program features to mitigate or eliminate negative impacts as able, or enhance program benefits for these groups.
- Program impacts on residential and multifamily projects geared toward low-income and affordable housing.
- Improved community outcomes for residential areas surrounding product manufacturer locations, including potential reductions to air pollution through supporting uptake of different manufacturing equipment.
- Communicating program requirements for a broad stakeholder base with possible support for first-language not-English (FLNE) business owners.
- Education efforts to advance these considerations at the state and local level.
- Developers, building owners, product manufacturers, grantor staff, code writers, and other jurisdiction staff as needed.
- County staff, such as with legal counsel on program designs; with procurement to advertise and contract with a consultant for program support; with code or construction oversight staff; and to collaborate on grant applications for additional program funds.
- Track program performance and regularly report on program outputs and outcomes to support building decarbonization reporting to the EPA and ECO dashboard.
- Perform other duties as assigned.
Experience, Qualifications, Knowledge, Skills
Experience, Qualifications, Knowledge, Skills
- At least five years’ experience in building decarbonization, energy efficiency, energy codes, or similar program or project management, with some demonstrated experience advancing embodied carbon initiatives.
- Demonstrated success managing complex projects and resources.
- Experience in:
- Project and program management, including planning, organizing, budgeting, and designing new projects or programs.
- Advancing justice, inclusion, and equity at an individual and organizational level.
- Coordinating with a variety of interested parties, developers, community members, code writers, advocacy organizations, elected officials, and state and local governmental agencies.
- Familiarity with local, state, and federal policies, regulations and incentives related to embodied carbon.
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
- Strong systems thinking and organizational skills.
- Strong analytical and problem-solving skills.
- Ability to thrive in a dynamic environment by anticipating and adjusting to change.
Desired- Functional and technical knowledge and experience in energy efficiency, building electrification, and decarbonization of residential, commercial and/or industrial buildings – policies, program models, technologies, operations, design and delivery.
- Commitment to relationship building and uplifting community voices.
- Experience in:
- Leading focus groups, workshops, and collaborative governance processes.
- Building coalitions and managing complex stakeholder relationships.
- Working with limited English-speaking populations, immigrant/refugee communities, BIPOC communities and culturally diverse communities.
- Approaching challenges with a critical lens to understand the root causes of problems and arrive at the best possible solutions and outcomes.
- Working in federal grant-funded programs, including meeting federal grant reporting and managing contracts paid with federal funds.
Supplemental Information
Forbes recently named King County as one of Washington State's best employers.
Together, with leadership and our employees, we're changing the way government delivers service and winning national recognition as a model of excellence. Are you ready to make a difference? Come join the team dedicated to serving one of the nation's best places to live, work and play.
Guided by our "True North", we are making King County a welcoming community where every person can thrive. We value diversity, inclusion and belonging in our workplace and workforce. To reach this goal we are committed to workforce equity. Equitable recruiting, support, and retention is how we will obtain the highest quality workforce in our region; a workforce that shares and will help advance our guiding principles--we are one team; we solve problems; we focus on the customer; we drive for results; we are racially just; we respect all people; we lead the way; and we are responsible stewards. We encourage people of all backgrounds and identities to apply, including Native American and people of color, immigrants, refugees, women, LGBTQ+, people living with disabilities, and veterans.
King County is an Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Employer
No person is unlawfully excluded from employment opportunities based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex (including gender identity, sexual orientation and pregnancy), age, genetic information, disability, veteran status, or other protected class. 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.
WHO MAY APPLY:
This appointed opportunity is open to all qualified applicants.
WORK LOCATION and TELECOMMUTING REQUIREMENT
The work associated with this position will be performed in a hybrid fashion of on-site and telework. This position will need to report to the work location three days a week (likely Tuesday-Thursday). Employees will also have access to shared workspaces at King Street Chinook Building at 401 5th Avenue in downtown Seattle. There will be situations where the employee may be required to report to a County worksite. Employees must reside in WA state and within a reasonable distance to their King County worksite to respond to workplace reporting requirements.
WORK SCHEDULE:
This position is exempt from the provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act and is not overtime eligible. The typical work week is 40 hours per week, Monday – Friday. This position is not represented by a labor organization.
FORMS AND MATERIALS REQUIRED:
Please submit a complete online application, resume and cover letter describing how your education and/or experience relate to the qualifications for this position.
Your options are to:
- Copy and paste one or more documents into the Text Resume section of the application, or
- Attach multiple documents/files in the Resume Attachment section.
Your application may be rejected as incomplete if you do not include the relevant information in the online application and include the information only on the cover letter and resume.
Applications responses stating "see my resume" or "see my personnel file" are considered incomplete and will not be accepted.
CONTACT: If you have any questions about the application requirements, please contact HR Manager Seth Watson (
seth.watson@kingcounty.gov) or HR Analyst Dan Grant (
dan.grant@kingcounty.gov).