WOMEN IN LEADERSHIP
SCIENCE
Cindy Messer
Chief Deputy Director
California Department of Water Resources
Cindy Messer considers one of her greatest professional accom-
plishments also the toughest experience in her 23-year career.
Messer was sworn in as chief deputy director of the Califor-
nia Department of Water Resources the day after the Oroville
Dam crisis began in February 2017, when damage to both the
main and emergency spillways forced the evacuation of more
than 180,000 residents. But within months, her boss retired,
and she became acting interim director for the recovery phase.
Today, Messer says she feels proud of her efforts to lead the de-
partment through this unsettled period and to engage residents
warranted in their anger.
“I was the person to go out and be the face at the public
meetings,” Messer says. “It was very important for me — I get
choked up talking about it — to make sure that the public knew
that the department (was) very empathetic to the fact that it was
a very scary time; it disrupted people’s lives, it was a lot of un-
certainty. We wanted to make a commitment that we were going
to fix this, and we were going to do that in a short amount of
time to make sure that next winter, folks were going to be safe.”
Raised in Pittsburg and Antioch, Messer’s interest in water
developed during her childhood, with many weekends spent
fishing with her dad in the San Joaquin River and going to
Brannan Island State Recreation Area in the Sacramento-San
Joaquin Delta. She earned her bachelor’s degree in environmen-
tal policy analysis and planning from UC Davis and her master’s
degree in conservation biology from Sacramento State.
In 1997, Messer joined DWR as a scientific aide and soon
progressed to environmental scientist. In 2005, she took on a
supervisory role. “I love science, and I really admire the folks
who do it, but it wasn’t necessarily my plan for the long run,”
she says. “I’m a people person, so I thought, well, I’m going to
try my hand at this.” In 2010, she became assistant executive
officer for the new Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta Conservan-
cy, charged with implementing ecosystem restoration projects.
In 2012, she became deputy director of the Delta Stewardship
Council, tasked with coordinating the preparation and imple-
mentation of the Delta Plan, a long-term comprehensive plan
for the region. In 2016, Messer returned to DWR as assistant
chief deputy director.
Messer attributes her success to her grandmother, who
emigrated from France to the United States in her 20s without
knowing how to speak English. “She just set this really great
example for me about work ethic and how to treat people, and
how family is important,” Messer says. “A lot of my coworkers
here, I call it my DWR family. It’s very important for me to have
that element, and everywhere I have worked has had that. I try
to generate it, but I’m also looking for it.”
68
comstocksmag.com | March 2020
by Sena Christian