“Although we are humbled and appreciate the award, I won’t say BKF is the best, because there are a lot of incredible engineering firms in the North Bay.”—Geoff Coleman, Vice President, BKF Engineers
With 480-plus staff members in 16 West Coast offices, BKF is a mid-sized regional engineering firm, and this year, its Santa Rosa office, run by Vice Presidents Geoff Coleman and Jason Kirchmann, has won NorthBay biz magazine’s Best Engineering Firm award.
Originally started by Willis “Jack” Frost as Jack Frost Surveyors in Redwood City in 1915—an opportunity born out of the 1906 Earthquake—the firm has seen a few name changes and evolutions in leadership in its more than a century-long history, but has continued to offer exemplary civil engineering and land surveying services that help shape the communities they serve.
BKF’s Santa Rosa branch offers both civil engineering and land surveying services. “When asked what it is we do, in simple terms, civil engineering is the design of infrastructure and for BKF, this is everything outside, other than the buildings themselves,” says Coleman. “Civil engineering consists of planning and designing infrastructure for communities. If someone has a piece of land they want to develop, we’d be responsible for planning and designing the roads, parking lots, water lines, sanitation systems and storm drains—we determine how to slope the ground and where the water will run when it rains.”
The company also works on schools, hospitals and parks, and provides services to municipalities. It also partnered with market rate and affordable housing entities, including Burbank Housing, to help design several affordable housing projects such as Lantana Homes, a recently completed single family residential housing project in Santa Rosa. BKF designed Caritas Village, a joint venture between Burbank Housing and Catholic Charities, located in downtown Santa Rosa, which is currently in construction. They also designed Roseland Village, a MidPen affordable housing community with a one-acre park in southwest Santa Rosa. Other notable projects include designing more than 300 of the homes lost in Coffey Park to the Tubbs Fire and Russian River Brewing’s new facility in Windsor.
BKF’s other main service in the North Bay region is land surveying, which consists of determining property boundaries and creating computerized digital terrain models of the earth’s surface to help with the design process.
What makes BKF the best? “Although we are humbled and appreciate the award, I won’t say BKF is the best, because there are a lot of incredible engineering firms in the North Bay,” says Coleman. “However, I can tell you some of the things that make BKF great, including our staff, clients and the incredible projects we are so privileged to work on,” he says. BKF strives to create an inclusive environment that draws a diverse group of people having varying perspectives. This promotes creativity, innovation and broadens our awareness, which are really important qualities for our engineers and surveyors to have.”
Realizing this, BKF established a Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Council with four dedicated Employee Research Groups (representing early professionals, LGBTQ+, multicultural, and women of BKF) whose objectives are to identify and facilitate initiatives that promote and enhance these principles within the company.
Giving back to the community is another emphasis for BKF. “Aside from the technical component, we enjoy giving back to our community, whether it’s donating our services or raising money for causes we believe in,” he says. “Earlier this year, several of our staff participated in a Rebuilding Together event and helped cleanup homes that needed paint, landscaping, plumbing and electrical. We like to give back by supporting educational programs, participating in the local trig-star event, science fair, or presenting to our local high school to explain the important role engineers and surveyors play in our society. Members of our staff participate in the ‘Bike to Hope’ annual event in a fight against cancer, diabetes and other life-threatening illnesses. This past year the group raised over $270,000.”
BKF also serves as a trusted advisor to local municipalities. Coleman helped draft Santa Rosa’s fire ordinance and prepare the North Bay’s Low Impact Development Technical Manual. Coleman has been with BKF for more than 20 years, starting in 1998, and looks forward to continuing BKF’s legacy.
[Photo courtesy of BKF Engineers]
