FORT WORTH, Texas – Fort Worth District Chief of Water Resources Jerry Cotter was named the 2015 Ronald J. Ruffennach Communicator of the Year and will be formally presented the award at the Districts Quarterly Awards Ceremony, March 24.
This top award is named in honor of the late Ronald J. Ruffennach, who was the Chief of the Fort Worth District Public Affairs Office and considered one of the best to ever work in that career field. It recognizes a member of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers outside of the Public Affairs career field for outstanding contributions in communicating USACE missions and programs.
As the Chief of Water Resources, Cotter is responsible for managing and executing one of the Fort Worth District’s top priorities – water resources. Those responsibilities extended to ‘round the clock’ operations during the Texas Spring Floods of 2015. He led his team to provide timely modeling and real-time analysis of the flood situation, while simultaneously acting as a liaison keeping emergency managers, community leaders, Congressional members and other key stakeholders updated on the District’s flood fight operations in the Dallas-Fort Worth area and throughout the state of Texas.
Cotter was already recognized as one of the top liaison engineers to our stakeholders, and his outstanding work as the primary subject-matter-expert before, during and after the Spring floods earned him the same accolades as a top spokesperson with local, regional, national and international media. These achievements were also recognized this Fall when Jerry received Fort Worth District’s ‘Golden Mike Award’.
“It takes a special and highly talented professional to be able to successfully run major operations for a flood fight the magnitude of what we encountered this past Spring, while simultaneously serving as the subject-matter expert and spokesperson to meet the needs of media outlets who run on 24-hour news cycles. Jerry is that person and his ability to communicate often technical information about water supply and flood operations is just one of the many reasons he deserves this top communicator award,” said Col. Calvin C. Hudson II, commander, Fort Worth District.
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About the Fort Worth District: The Fort Worth District, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was established in 1950. The District is responsible for water resources development in two-thirds of Texas, and design and construction at military installations in Texas and parts of Louisiana and New Mexico. Visit the Fort Worth District Web site at: www.swf.usace.army.mil and SWF Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Fort-Worth-District-US-Army-Corps-of-Engineers/188083711219308
Release no. 16-012