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Kista
Maria Thomas
Kista Maria Thomas
received the Young Construction Engineer of the Year Award.
Kista Maria (Babb) Thomas
was born March 14, 1976 in Lexington, Kentucky. She is the second of
four children born to Douglas and Lois Babb. A very close-knit family,
they never miss an opportunity to come together on birthdays, holidays,
and every week for Sunday dinner. Besides a respect for family, her
parents also encouraged her to strive for excellence, persevere, and
never forget God in her life.
Kista attended Cardinal Valley Elementary School, Leestown Middle School,
and Paul Laurence Dunbar High School. She graduated from Dunbar 13th
in her class in 1994 and was a member of the Beta Club and the Honor
Society. In the fall of 1994, she enrolled at the University of Kentucky
in the Civil Engineering department.
While at UK, she was a member of Tau Beta Pi National Honor Society,
the Society of Women Engineers (SWE), and treasurer for the National
Society of Black Engineers (NSBE). In December of 1998, she graduated
Summa Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering.
After graduation, Kista accepted a position with Judy Construction Company
as a project engineer. Initially, she worked with the head estimator
bidding several water and wastewater treatment plant projects. She also
assisted the project managers at Judy by generating schedules, cost
codes, and updating pay requests. Then in 2000, she started her first
field project, the $800,000 Ashland Belt Press Replacement Project.
This small project was a great opportunity to manage a project from
start to finish.
Also in 2000, she was the project engineer on the $12.5 million Cedar
Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP) in Louisville, Ky. This project
was a design/build project in lieu of the traditional design/bid/build,
so it was an excellent learning experience for her. After the success
of the Cedar Creek project, Judy Construction Company pursued another
design/build project in 2003 at the Hite Creek WWTP in Louisville. Again,
Kista was part of the management team, but this time as the assistant
project manager of the $11 million plant.
She has worked on several projects since then, which include: the $3.3
million Versailles WWTP (2004), the $7 million Hardinsburg WTP (2005),
and the $11 million Wood Creek WTP (2005) in London, Ky. Currently,
she is working on the $5.6 million Williamsburg WTP (Phase I and II)
projects and the upcoming $5 million design/build project at the Pirtle
Springs WTP in Hardin Co., Ky. Throughout her short career, Kista has
been involved in every aspect of the construction of treatment plants
-- from the initial bidding, to the project set up, to the management
of the construction.
Besides being a full-time engineer, Kista is also a full-time mother.
She has a lovely three-year-old daughter, Kiara, who brings happiness
and excitement to her life. Kista and her daughter live in Lexington
and attend the St. John Baptist Church, where she is a Sunday school
teacher and an usher. In addition to attending church, the family enjoys
riding bikes, reading books, and playing computer games together.
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