Extra Mile Podcast: MDOT Chief of Staff Jeff Ely

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*INTRO MUSIC*

(Paul Katool) That’s nearly 2 billion and that's money that's going to be spent on improving safety, enhancing mobility and improving economic growth and development in the state of Mississippi.

(Will) Yeah. And with this historic funding from the legislature, new construction will be popping up all over Mississippi.

(Drew Hall) MDOT presents the Extra Mile Podcast.

(Brad White) Men and women of the Department of Transportation are up to the task and up to make sure that we deliver a product that the taxpayers can be proud of. So, I'm ready for us to go to work.

(Paul) Welcome into another edition of the extra mile podcast presented by the Mississippi department of transportation.
I'm Paul Katool. And as always, I'm joined by my cohost Will Craft, and we are super excited about today's episode. We are going to do a legislative wrap up episode today. We're going to take a little detour and talk to MDOT chief of staff. Of course, Jeff Ely, a little bit about Mr. Ely. He is a professional engineer and he started with the agency back in 2002, doing various engineering jobs here.
And he was promoted to chief of staff in 2022. Jeff, I know you're a busy man, lots going on. Thank you for joining the podcast and coming back and talking with us.

(Jeff Ely) Thanks for having me.

(Will) 2002. That was a few days ago. 22, correct? Does it seem like 22 years?

(Jeff) It doesn't. Uh, time has definitely flown by.

(Will) That's crazy.

(Jeff) A lot of good jobs here at MDOT. I've enjoyed everyone and, you know. Each time I feel like I'm in my favorite position. So

(Will) That’s awesome. We were talking about needing to do an update on a Public Affairs project and last time I've been working on it was 2016 and I was like, well, that was just oh, well No, that was eight years ago.
Wow. Yeah, time flies. Well, we'll jump right into it, Jeff. Thanks again for joining us. We've got several different things to talk about today. Lots of internal stuff or a little internal stuff, but some newsworthy things, not the least of which the talk of the town the last few years, as far as our legislation and big stuff goes, capacity projects, we've got some going on around the state.
Any status updates on some of those?

(Jeff) I can share some information there. Of course, Paul mentioned that we'll do a podcast in the near future on ramping up the legislative session. But just to kind of recap from 2023, the department received 450 million for capacity projects, and we are able to fund four pretty big projects out of that.
One that recently left was state route 15 and Union County from one mile north of state route four to roughly Ripley. And then on I 20 going toward here and Vicksburg at Flowers, there's an interchange that we are going to be reconstructing. And then U. S. Highway 90 from 609 to Dolphin Drive, there's a widened project that we're working on acquiring right away there and relocating utilities to hopefully let that happen later this year.
And then state route 19 from 4 92 to Tucker which will close the four-lane highway between Philadelphia and Meridian.

(Will) All huge projects. I know Vicksburg and Neshoba for sure. Or Philadelphia. Have been talked about for a long time getting done. So that would be really great.

(Paul) Big, big deals right there for sure. And then again mentioned, we'll talk more on the session, but there was some money at one time money put in two big projects in North Mississippi. Correct.

(Jeff) That's right. So, two more capacity projects. It looks like we'll be able to advance after this session. Highway seven in Fayette County.
It's been around for a long time and a lot of people are talking about it. That will be a good, good project both for safety and to help manage capacity. And then we have a segment of I 55 in DeSoto County from Church Road to 302. Highway 302 is also Goodman Road. It looks like we will be able to advance.
There's a little bit of a funding gap, but we're working on closing that gap so that we can go ahead and let both of those projects we're still working on finalizing the plans and acquiring right away, but both of them will be ready very soon.

(Will) Exciting stuff. We've got projects going everywhere.
We'll just kind of bounce around a little bit on the outline here, but talking about that same kind of deal, we've got lots of grant applications going in, some of these projects, a little carryover between them. One we just got awarded first, though, a PROTECT grant down in South Mississippi, working on some CONTRAFLOW improved the hurricane evacuation route, right?

(Jeff) Yeah, that will be a good project. You know, for anytime we have country flow. It requires a whole lot of manpower. We have had to have people stationed at every exit in the past. We've done that with law enforcement when M dot had an enforcement branch. Since we no longer have that, though, you know, it would revert back to our district forces.
So, our technicians that you know, we're also responsible for clearing highways and doing things like that in an emergency event. So this protect grant will allow us to automate some of that work, install some gates and you know, for folks that travel different states, Georgia does this on their evacuation routes where they have gates so you can go out there and lower the gate and you don't have to have somebody sitting there, you know, for the duration to make sure that traffic is not Trying to get off on that, use that ramp, essentially, of course, there's going to be a couple.
geometric reconfigurations that we'll have to do to accommodate that at some of the interchanges where the contraflow ends. But that's going to be a really, really good project and useful if you know, we're ever in the situation again that we have to reverse traffic on one direction of the highways.

(Will) I was not old enough to really be aware of what was going on if that has taken place before.

(Paul) Katrina maybe? Was that the last time?

(Jeff) That may have been the last time we did it. And You know, it's, it's, it's interesting to watch it. You've got a lot of people that are, you know, they're leaving home, and they don't know what they're leaving or what they're getting into or when they'll be able to return.
You know, a lot of times, hopefully the storm isn't as bad as anticipated, or there's not as much damage as was expected. And people are able to get back into their communities pretty quickly. But of course, during Katrina, it was really bad. A lot of highways were Blocked interstates were blocked. And, you know, M dot is the front line going to clear the highway so that emergency vehicles can get in and can assess as quickly as possible and help people that did not get out of town.

(Will) I did a little bit of a side topic here, but I went on a couple of mission trips. I guess you'd call them youth groups and stuff going down to clean up. This was weeks, maybe months after the storm. I can't imagine being one of our crew folks going down there kind of first responding first on site and seeing that damage.
I know we had a great podcast with Governor Barber a couple, maybe a year ago talking about some of that. And I imagine that some of that imagery really sticks with you. But Lord willing, we don't have to do that again. We want to see another storm like that. We're going to put that voodoo in there that it's just not going to happen.

(Paul) Oh, yeah, that's right. For sure. For sure. So, switching gears a little bit whenever we've run interviews with potential new employees. One of the things that always kind of gets brought up is professional development. So, I understand that there is kind of a new program in place at MDOT leads. Can you tell us a little bit about that?

(Jeff) Absolutely. That's you know, probably 15 years ago, we had a program that was called lead that helps us develop. up and coming leaders. And we have not done anything with that program since around 2000 and seven. So, one of my goals was to get that stood back up and help develop the people that are moving into leadership here within the department.
One, one, I guess, interesting fact that I stumbled on a few weeks ago as I was preparing for something else is that in the last year, we have seen a turnover rate of over 30 percent in our division directors and above. So, the people that are leading our divisions, leading our districts work in our administration, a third of them have and, and, you know, we have new people in those roles.
So, this was actually after we started the lead backup that we started that I've, I've figured this out. But we have, LEAD is a yearlong program. We'll have ten sessions around the state where we discuss a lot of different topics. Conflict resolution, characteristics of leaders, change management, delegation, generational differences.
There are so many components to managing people. And it's almost easier, I've discovered for myself that sometimes it's easier for me to handle, you know, a technical program than. Leading the team, you know everybody has different personalities and understanding how those personalities work together can be a challenge for some people.
So, we thought it was important that we start to restart, I guess, educating our staff and our up-and-coming leaders on how to manage people and in addition to the program. So, it's, it's, I would say it's been very successful. Will's a part of that program and we have spent a lot of good time together.
You know, our people are our greatest resource. And one of the things that I have noticed about this class of up-and-coming leaders, which there's 32 in the program right now, is over the last seven months, they not only have been exposed to leadership techniques and how to work with people, but they have also bonded and developed real close relationships with one another.
So I've seen a lot of unity in that group and growth in that group just, you know, on a On a personal level, and that's very important, is that just getting to know the people that you work with and there, you know, they're engineers, they're non engineers, they're accountants, they're, you know, it's just a broad background from all divisions and districts and agency.
So, they get to know people that work in other areas in the future. I've got a question about something. I've gotten to know so and so who works, you know, in this division. I can go talk to them and, hopefully, resolve my issue.

(Will) It's been, you know, from, from my personal experience, it's been very beneficial.
It's kind of like aside from all the leadership growth opportunity stuff, the classes, the things that we're being taught, just the networking aspect of it, what you're talking about. It's almost kind of like cross training light, you know, like I don't know how to do any of their jobs, but I'm much more familiar with what goes on in so many different other aspects of MDOT and being in public affairs.
Obviously, that's extremely useful because generally we're involved with a little bit of everything that goes on inside the agency. So, there have been great folks out there looking for a job, no better place to come work. On that note, I think I saw a job posting right before we came in here. We had a Facebook post about a construction engineer, engineering three, engineer three.
However, the technical terms go, I'm going to lose it, but a great engineering job in the construction division. So, shout out to Shane Martin and the guys down there looking for some help. I think that's far and wide. We're going to have some videos coming up in the next couple of months speaking specifically to recruitment but parlaying that into succession planning.
A similar topic to what you're just talking about though. The importance of that. Jeff, what have you got?

(Jeff) Yeah, so you know our numbers have been down significantly from years. We're somewhere in the ballpark of around 20, between 600 employees. I think if we were ideally staffed, we would have closer to 3000 employees.
A lot of that is in the area of our maintenance technicians. Of course there have been some with the State Personnel Board. They have a new restructuring. They restructure their job classifications and pay grades. Of course, salaries have always been our biggest challenge, but, with their new salary structures, that has helped us to recruit at that level.
And, and we've done a tremendous job, of course, you know, with, with every new person that we bring on, there's a retiree or, you know, somebody that but wages are more competitive now. So that has helped us tremendously. And of course, you know, when you do have a, I mentioned the 30 percent turnover rate at division director and above a few minutes ago, when you have, when you're dealing with that, it's very important that, you know, your folks are working together and they're planning for the future and they're training, you know, they're, I'd say training their replacement.
But, you know, your staff is fully informed so that somebody can step in when it is time for you to. Move on so, Certainly, we try to do that and even in the recent past, we have put more effort forth with succession planning and, you know, that's something as division leaders that y'all could understand is you know, when you lose one, you have a gap there, but do you have somebody who can, you know, step over and fill that role and help you continue on.

(Will) Absolutely. We are filling a position we've had open for quite some time in the next couple of weeks here. I've been very much needed, just haven't had the kind of opportunity to fill it until recently. But along those same lines, we were missing a person to do some of that work and the succession plan there is finally coming back around.
So, we'll have that all filled. But again, there is no better time or place to come sign up. We got great stuff going on at MDOT. Pay is improving. Coming to work for the state, you get all the holidays. You get great benefits. Good insurance plan. For those of you fresh out of college, you may not understand that yet.
I certainly did not. You're probably all smarter than me, but man, there's something to be said about having that insurance stake, what is it, 19%? I think. Employer contribution into the retirement program. Employees are 9%. You're talking about 28 percent of your paycheck, the equivalent of going into your retirement.
That's, I don't know if that number is seen out in the private market very often. That's a pretty good chunk of change going into retirement. But overall recruitment is going well, though we're filling some stuff up. I think we talked about all the grant Applica well, most of the grant applications going in, a couple that maybe we didn't.
I 20, another capacity project we're applying for a grant, 19 I think was mentioned. I think the only one is Highway 15, that's not a grant that we're doing, but was recently let, correct? Is that right?

(Jeff) That's right, that was one of our capacity projects that was funded from, from last year. Yep.

(Will) Huge project, everybody's been looking forward to that one for a long time, I know Senator Wicker has asked multiple times for updates on, on status of that project, so that should, when is it set, do you know when it's set to go to construction?

(Jeff) I don't. There's a, you know, once a project's been let, there's a few things that have to happen before we issue a notice to proceed, which means a contractor can go to work and they, you know, it was awarded recently, so they're in the process right now of, of getting everything in order.
So, I would imagine within the next few months, you'll start seeing, you know, move dirt. And I may have sidetracked on the grants a little while ago and started talking about the capacity projects, but you know, outside of legislative funding for capacity. M dot has very little resources that we can apply to these bigger projects simply because we have to fund.
We have to maintain what we own. You know, it's just like in the house. You're not going to put an addition on if you got, you know, boards falling off the walls and, you know, the ceilings caving in. You have to make sure that you maintain your assets first. And, you know, with any money that's left over, you can build and expand and grow.
And it's simply the fact that M dot doesn't have that left over even operating as efficiently as we possibly can. So, you know, there are several grand opportunities that we look at throughout the year. Of course, M dot takes advantage of everyone that we can as far as submitting an application.
So, um, highway 55 State Route seven highway 50 Interstate 55 Minnesota County and State Route seven or two that I mentioned earlier. Of course, we're going to submit grant applications on those. We have a project that we've been looking at for a while and here through Jackson on at 20 That, and everybody that drives I 20 knows that that the pavement condition is, I mean, it's, it's rough.
It is pretty rough there. And, yeah, there's a lot of structures out there. That's a really difficult place to work because of the traffic volumes, you know, just the geometry of the roadway, the number of bridges. So, we're looking at possible grant funds to help move that project along, which will involve, of course, more repairs to the pavements.
There's they're working on the surface right now, but more repairs to the payment and all of those bridges that are along that route. And then I guess we've mentioned 2019 55 67. Yeah. So that one's a little bit unique. That I would say falls in the category of more of a safety project when you have a Corridor that's rural in nature like that one that has a lot of median crossings.
You can run into a lot of safety issues So there's a concept that we refer to as a super street corridor Which eliminates a lot of the crossovers. It does not eliminate the opportunity for traffic to flow or to make turns, but it does help improve safety by just rerouting traffic a little bit. So

(Will) Do we have any of those elsewhere?

(Jeff) I'm sure some exist. You know when you are, you may not be familiar with Super Street, but maybe a J turn, or an R cut. And then that's where you take, you either eliminate a median crossover and provide traffic with an opportunity to do a U turn upstream, or you make the median crossover directional. If you're from the metro area, we've got a couple of those on, we've got one on.
on Lakeland past Dogwood. And in front of Primo's as well, back toward Jackson. But it just eliminates some of the movements to help improve safety and traffic flow through that area.

(Paul) Good stuff. Lots of projects are going on. So, we were originally going to have Jeff on in April. So, we'll touch on this briefly talking about safety.
It was National Work Zone Awareness Month in April. But the chief of staff kind of wants to put a safety message out there for our workers and for everybody driving through work zones.

(Jeff) Absolutely. You know I'm glad you brought that up because we did. We honored our fallen workers back in April and nationwide.
It's a thing nationwide where that week of April 15th those workers were remembered across the country. But since 2000 There have been 840 safe work zone fatalities across the nation and, and, you know, that's attributed to a lot of things. Much of it, I would say, is distracted driving.
Another factor is speeding. 30 percent of those are speeding. And I just can't fathom somebody speeding through an active work zone. But, you know, it happens and, you know, especially if you're distracted, whether you're paying attention to your radio in the car or you're, you know, eating a hamburger or You got yourself on in your hand in front of your face.
I mean, you know those, those people have families and its dangerous work. And when you mix in distractions and speeding it makes it even more dangerous. Currently, we have 49 names on our memorial in front of our building of workers that we have lost over the years. And We don't want to add anybody to that.
So, my message would be, of course, pay attention all the time when you're driving. But certainly, when you're in a work zone where there are people standing right next to the, you know, the travel lane and they're doing their service to improve the infrastructure for you as drivers, you know, and for me as a driver.

(Will) And I'm pretty sure you'll agree with this. I'll interject this here. You know, I've heard before, like, well, you know, why are we slowing down? I went to work, approaching the work zone. I don't see anybody out there. You know, while that may be true, I heard a former director of ours used to always say that geometry may be different, though.
You know, you may be used to going straight through that intersection or not an intersection, but a piece of stretch of road. And now there's work going on out there and not so, you know, you got to hit a loop de loop or whatever the technical term is. And you're going through there. We didn't know that you're still driving up to it doing 70 miles an hour.
You know, just because there's no people there doesn't mean you shouldn't still adhere to the work zone. I think probably just as many accidents happen that way from people going through an area that they're always familiar with. You know, I think that with the old saying, most of the Most of your traffic accidents happen within one mile of your own home or something.
Because you get so comfortable and so, you know, relaxed in that environment. So, just because you don't see people there doesn't mean you shouldn't still adhere to the work zone. Shout out to myself. Because I know I'm guilty of lots of those things. Definitely trying to eat and looking at my phone.
I try not to look at my phone. I got an MDOT sticker on the back of my truck. I feel like that's just very hypocritical. But I have definitely been chowing down on some McDonald's driving around in the states before. Not the best idea either, but. It happens.

(Paul) Put the phones down, folks. You know, these are coworkers, our friends.
So, let's keep everybody. Let's get everybody where they need to be at the end of their shift and take them home to their families. All right. So, anything else? Should we hit the fun questions?

(Will) yeah, man, let's do it.

(Paul) All right. So, I know we met you last year and you had a really good answer, but I know you travel around the state a lot.
Any new places that you've been to? It’s absolutely delicious.

(Jeff) There's a lot. There's a lot of new places that are absolutely delicious. But you know, I think last time I mentioned Bozo's Seafood Pascagoula, definitely a go place for a good po boy or I used, you know, they used to supply my crawfish when I boiled crawfish.
But you know, if we want to shift over to a good steakhouse back on the coast in Ocean Springs, there's a place called Cheryl's and it's on Highway 90. The best ribeye I've ever eaten. The best. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Give them a try.

(Will) Add it to the list, Drew.
That's right. Add it to the list. And we're going to put that thing out. I think right now you have to give us a five-star review in order to receive this list. We are a little bit barter and exchanging for that. So, we'd still love your five-star reviews if you want to jump on there and give them to us, but we're going to make that available for folks at some point.
I may have to bribe Drew to let it happen. Yeah, no, shout out to Cheryl's, that's awesome. Another thing we love to do, we love to eat, we love to listen to music. I was just talking about a couple of songs that I can't get out of my head. What about a favorite concert, or maybe one that you've been to in the last year or so?
You're a Brandon Amphitheater guy, aren't you?

(Jeff) Yeah, I do, I do. I am glad we have the amphitheater. There's been a lot of good music coming through there. I will say that my favorite concert was not at the Brandon Amphitheater. Okay. But I'm a big fan of Chicago, late sixties era, Chicago. And I'll tell you, they put on a show a couple of years ago, probably around 2016, they were at Dye Mar Hall.
And of course they've been to the Brandon Amphitheater since then, but I did not go to that one. But it's just, it's a really, really good show, you know, different band members. Some are different band members since that they were in the, in the sixties, but same music. And, and it's just, it's really good.

(Paul) some good horns, you know, in there. That's the good stuff right there. I love country music, but I feel like 90 percent of the answers we get in Mississippi country music. So, we love to Mix it up. There we go. Well, that's awesome. Well, lots of good information today. So, Jeff, thank you so much for joining us and coming on.

(Jeff) Absolutely. Thank you.

(Paul) So we'll wrap things up right there. Thank you to our listeners or viewers for tuning into the extra mile podcast. You can watch and listen to episodes by visiting go m. com forward slash the extra mile. Follow us on social media at Mississippi dot is the handle there.

We want to give a shout out to Drew Hall holding things down behind the scenes. And remember to drive smart out there on Mississippi highways.

*SHOW OUTRO*