Our Team
Our team’s highly trained, technically competent, personnel have continuously provided the highest level of service to municipalities and counties along the Mississippi Gulf Coast delivering cost effective, timely, and satisfactory service to meet client needs.
Camille Covington Smith
Chief Executive Officer
Todd Hairston
Business Development Officer
Robert Kroger, PhD, PWS
Chief Scientific Officer
Ben Benvenutti, PE
Principal Engineer
John Szabo, PE
Senior Consulting Engineer
Andrew Levens, PE
Senior Engineer/Engineering Manager
Sarah McLellan, PE
Project Engineer
Kenneth Page
Civil Designer
Bob Gist
Senior Construction Manager
Alane Young, RPG
Senior Geologist
Thomas Strange, PWS
Senior Scientist/Program Manager
Rachel Kistler
Scientist
Shane Monroe, CFE
Program Manager
Daniel Allen
Project Manager
Jessica Zatopek
Accounting Manager/Project Manager
Kim Goodman
Staff Accountant
Julie Daughdrill
Office Manager/Project Assistant
G. Rimmer Covington, Sr.
Founder and Principal
A Gulf Coast native, Rimmer founded his original company, Covington & Associates, which ultimately transformed into its nexus: Covington Civil & Environmental, LLC. He is a senior operational plan manager for the company. Internally, Rimmer provides executive oversight and monitors compliance with contractual obligations, ethics, IT policies and procedures, and document management and controls.
Rimmer has 23 years of experience conducting environmental due diligence and coordinating engineering and environmental business activities at CCE. Rimmer served on the ASTM Main and subcommittees that developed ASTM Practice E1527-05, which has become known as ‘All Appropriate Inquiry’ and the most recent “Standards and Practices for All Appropriate Inquiries” 40 Code of Federal Regulations, Section 312 which drew heavily from ASTM E1527-05.
Land Acquisition and Right of Entry is sometimes a considerable component of our clients’ programs and projects. He is an expert in acquiring land rights that are necessary as the means to establish right of entry and control of land for various industrial and energy objectives. He possesses more than 34 years of experience in matters of title research and abstracts of title, all forms of land conveyances, servitudes and right-of-ways, negotiations for settlements, title curative documents, and compiling and merging data for GIS mapping. Rimmer is a Certified Professional Landman and served as president of the American Association of Professional Landmen (AAPL) in 2009 and 2010.
Camille Covington Smith
Chief Executive Officer
Camille manages the firm’s day-to-day operation and provides oversight of human resources and financial functions. She directs program and project management with an emphasis on client relations and program coordination.
Camille has been involved in planning and implementation activities related to NRDA, NFWF GEBF, and RESTORE since 2012, including developing and awarding more than $790M in projects and programs. She has worked closely with representatives of state and federal agencies, developing processes for grant and financial activity tracking, reporting, and management to effectively monitor multimillion dollar projects across multiple landscapes.
Todd Hairston
Business Development Officer
Todd has 10 years of experience working with clients to achieve creative, sound solutions to environmental, real estate development, and program management projects. Todd holds a Bachelor of Science degree in environmental science from Delta State University. He and his wife Lacey, along with their two daughters, live in Gulfport and are active in community and economic development initiatives.
Robert Kroger, PhD, PWS
Chief Scientific Officer
Robert (Robbie) has more than 20 years of experience and is a nationally recognized scientist for water quality remediation and best management practice implementation in agricultural landscapes. Robbie leads our scientific support staff in formulating organizational strategies of funding streams, scientific support services, research analytics/data analysis, strategic coordination, and scientific writing. He also leads public engagement and communication, project results and monitoring, and the integration of projects across resource categories for coastal restoration. Robbie is currently one of the lead scientists for the Mississippi Coastal Restoration team in charge of science strategy for coastal restoration in lieu of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill.
Ben Benvenutti, PE
Principal Engineer
Ben brings more than 15 years of experience planning, permitting, designing, and managing critical infrastructure projects along the Gulf Coast for industrial, municipal, federal, and private clients. Ben provides technical guidance and oversight on all of Covington’s engineering projects.
Ben is a licensed Professional Engineer in Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, and Florida.
John Szabo, PE
Senior Consulting Engineer
John has more than 40 years of experience in both civil engineering and environmental consulting and is licensed as a Professional Engineer in Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, and Texas.
John has extensive experience in designing and managing civil engineering and real estate development projects. He has performed numerous environmental site assessments, investigations, and remediation designs for industrial sites throughout the United States. He possesses expertise in RCRA/CERCLA regulations; risk assessments; site remediation planning, permitting and implementation; landfill permitting, design, construction and operation; regulatory negotiations; expert witness services; and feasibility studies.
Andrew Levens, PE
Senior Engineer/Engineering Manager
Andrew is a senior civil and environmental engineer licensed in Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, and Texas. He brings over 10 years of civil and structural engineering experience, including water, sewer, roads, and drainage design and construction. Andrew has been involved in designing and preparing contract documents, master plans by analyzing existing systems, identifying deficiencies, and prioritizing repair of deficiencies for water, sewer, drainage, and road projects. Additionally, Andrew has experience in monitoring the construction of various projects, including construction of a pre-cast bridge, utility installation, lift station installation, water well installation, and sewage treatment lagoon upgrades. His work experience in structural engineering includes design and construction using steel, concrete and timber materials.
Sarah McLellan, PE
Project Engineer
Sarah is a junior civil engineer with experience in water, sewer, drainage, roadway, dredging, and marine design along with project management. Sarah has coordinated with state and federal agencies to obtain the proper permits and worked to receive grants for clients. In addition, Sarah is assigned with assisting the senior engineer in daily operations at Covington, including field verification and analysis.
Kenneth Page
Civil Designer
Kenneth (Kenny) has over 30 years of experience in the private sector and consulting fields of civil engineering. Throughout his career, he has served in roles of project management/RPR and CADD design of both civil and structural engineering projects. His civil design experience includes all aspects of municipal CADD design (i.e., cost estimating, water supply design; sanitary sewer collection/transmission system; sewage pump station; road reconstruction; bridge inspection; and other features associated with marina construction). In addition to design, Kenny also provided estimates of project cost for budget preparation and managed both project costs and schedule to ensure the projects were completed within the allotted time frame and at the lowest sustainable cost. Throughout his career, he has actively worked with municipal and private clients to plan and execute both capital and maintenance projects. He also has experience including construction/project management associated with FEMA and MEMA hurricane damage; and preparation of project work sheets for municipal reimbursement.
Bob Gist
Senior Construction Manager
Bob currently serves as our senior construction manager and assumes all project management duties within Covington. In addition to his corporate leadership and technical experience in leading strategic planning and development activities, Bob is also responsible for the overall direction, coordination and implementation of initial budgeting, schedules, bid packages, procurement, constructability issues, safety concerns, and quality control measures as they relate to construction activities from start-up through close-out and commissioning.
He has over 40 years of experience in the construction industry and was formally the executive vice president/chief operating officer of a highly successful Gulf Coast general contracting firm that managed revenues totaling $350-$500 million annually. Bob has a wealth of knowledge of the construction requirements at the local, state, and federal contracting levels and maintains many relationships within the general contractor and subcontractor communities on the Coast.
Alane Young, RPG
Senior Geologist
Alane is a senior geologist and serves as environmental science project manager at Covington. She has held the position of project manager/senior geologist throughout her 27-year career, with key responsibilities of conducting Phase I and Phase II environmental site assessments (ESAs), site characterizations, soil and groundwater assessment and remediation projects, Brownfields assessments, NEPA environmental assessments, and regulatory permitting.
Her experience includes site assessment, characterization and remediation at sites ranging from underground storage tank (UST) sites to RCRA facilities. She has extensive experience in managing NEPA compliance programs to satisfy federal funding requirements, including FEMA disaster recovery projects, HUD CDBG and entitlement funding projects, transportation projects for MDOT and FHWA, and projects related to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Her brownfields experience includes managing three-year U.S. EPA Brownfields assessment grants for two cities in Mississippi. Alane is a Registered Professional Geologist in Mississippi and Tennessee, and is also certified to close USTs in the state of Mississippi. She is also Louisiana Professional Geoscientist #448. She is a graduate of Leadership Gulf Coast and the Mississippi Gulf Coast Business Council Masters Program.
Thomas Strange, PWS
Senior Scientist/Program Manager
Thomas has over 15 years of experience with planning, permitting, and implementing public projects. He has worked collaboratively with multiple local, state, and federal agencies to assist in permitting of engineering and construction projects across the Mississippi Gulf Coast including stormwater and sewer projects, road projects, and beach enhancement projects.
Thomas has spent most of his professional career assessing and managing natural resources in the northern Gulf region. He provides science support, including restoration planning, data analysis and management, and science strategy for the Mississippi Restoration Team led by the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) related to the 2010 DWH oil spill.
Rachel Kistler
Scientist
Rachel has nearly 10 years of combined regulatory experience, field sampling, laboratory research, analytical testing, and environmental health and safety experience. At Covington, Rachel assists with RESTORE and NFWF restoration projects, regulatory permitting, ecological assessments and wetland delineations, Phase I and Phase II environmental site assessments, brownfields project management, soil and groundwater assessment and remediation projects, geospatial analysis and design, and regulatory compliance investigations. Throughout her career, Rachel has interacted and coordinated with members of local, state, and federal regulatory entities, land use developers, economic developers, port and harbor officials, environmental consultants, business and community leaders, special interest groups, and the general public.
Shane Monroe, CFE
Program Manager
Shane is a program manager with more than 15 years of experience in governmental financial monitoring and compliance. He is experienced in environmental planning, investigation and compliance, restoration project development and implementation, and restoration project management. He manages a wide variety of restoration-related projects ranging from those that address the eradication of invasive species to coastal marsh restoration.
Shane currently oversees all financial, project management, planning, and compliance-related duties for the RESTORE Act and NFWF-funded projects related to the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
Daniel Allen
Project Manager
Daniel is a project manager with over 10 years of construction and project management experience. He currently provides financial, project management, procurement, and compliance oversight for RESTORE and National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) funded projects related to the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
Previously, Daniel served as a project manager for U.S. Navy construction projects in support of combat and humanitarian missions around the world. His responsibilities included planning, scheduling, material procurement, implementation, and execution of construction projects including the construction of schools, hospitals, roads, bridges, runways, and housing for military personnel. Daniel also served as a program manager for both local and national environmental nonprofit organizations. He worked closely with federal partners at the National Park Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, and the Bureau of Land Management to develop conservation, restoration, and workforce development programs nationwide.
Jessica Zatopek
Accounting Manager/Project Manager
Jessica has eight years of experience and is the accounting manager, overseeing the firm’s daily accounting and financial operations. Jessica also serves as project manager for Deepwater Horizon restoration projects. She oversees sub-recipient project implementation, including the coordination, implementation, execution, control, and completion of project activities to ensure projects are completed within the authorized scope, schedule, and budget.
Kim Goodman
Staff Accountant
Kim Goodman is the staff accountant, responsible for maintaining financial records and procedures. She assists project managers and engineers through budget analysis and work-in-progress reports. In 2019, Kim earned her BSBA from the University of Southern Mississippi and began her accounting career working for a local nonprofit where she gained experience in fund-based accounting and purchasing through governmental agencies.
Julie Daughdrill
Office Manager/Project Assistant
As the officer manager, Julie is responsible for planning, organizing, and controlling the clerical aspect of the organization, including the preparation, communication, coordination and storage of data that supports production and other important operations of this professional establishment. Julie provides input to management on the development of policies and procedures for human resources, risk management, records management, and forms management. She has worked in the engineering environment for 15 years.