2022 Charles Durham Achievement Award

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Steve D. Kathol, president and CEO of Schemmer, is this year’s recipient of the Charles Durham Achievement Award given by ACEC Nebraska.

The award honors Charles Durham’s leadership in the engineering profession and his community stewardship through civic involvement. Durham served as chairman and CEO of Henningson, Durham and Richardson (HDR), the Omaha-based international engineering and architectural firm.

As president and CEO, Kathol is responsible for leadership, strategic vision, and building corporate culture across all Schemmer offices. His leadership approach and philosophies focus on an open-book management style, encouraging every employee to understand the company’s vision, strategy, and financial progress, thus creating a culture of ownership and empowering employees to go above and beyond to help Schemmer clients reach their goals. He fosters and supports a sense of community both inside and outside the walls of the organization.

Kathol has served in several leadership roles since joining the firm in 1994. He was named bridge department manager in 2001, elected to the Schemmer board of directors in 2006, named transportation group leader in 2010, and elected Schemmer president and CEO in 2014. He is Schemmer’s fifth president and CEO since the firm’s inception in 1959.

Steve is active in ACEC Nebraska, having served as state director in 2010, president in 2013-2014, and national director in 2015-2016. He is a member of the American Society of Civil Engineers and served as the Nebraska Chapter President in 2006. Steve is also a member of the Nebraska Society of Professional Engineers.

Schemmer encourages our professionals to connect with causes they care about. Steve exemplifies this in his commitment to the Boys Town Booster Club and his work as a board member with both the Boy Scouts of America Mid-America Council and the ACE Mentor Program of Greater Omaha.

Kathol is a graduate of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, earning a bachelor of science in civil engineering and a master of science in structural engineering. Steve is licensed as a professional engineer in nine states.

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Aaron Buettner

State Director

Aaron Buettner, PE, CVS leads Benesch’s Nebraska structural group, bringing more than 27 years of experience in structural engineering, project management and value engineering to every project he touches. His work spans highway, railroad and pedestrian bridges, and he has delivered public and private projects across the country involving a wide variety of materials and structure types.

Aaron’s technical depth covers the full project lifecycle, from structural design and in-service inspection to forensic evaluation and construction administration. He is proficient in multiple structural design and analysis software platforms and has a keen understanding of load paths and constructability. As a Certified Value Specialist (CVS), Aaron’s Value Engineering work has generated tens of millions of dollars in potential construction cost avoidance for clients ranging from state DOTs to transit agencies.

Notable projects include the Lincoln South Beltway, where his team designed 10 of 21 bridges on the freeway corridor; the N-12 Emergency Bridge Repairs in northeast Nebraska, where biddable plans for three flood-damaged structures were delivered in just three weeks; and the Penny Bridges Replacement in Lincoln, where value planning produced a context-sensitive solution that earned broad community support.

Aaron also serves as a Structures Specialist on Nebraska Task Force 1 (NE-TF1), which is one of 28 FEMA Urban Search & Rescue (US&R) teams located throughout the United States. In this role, he supports the search and rescue mission by assessing damaged structures, recommending structural hazard mitigation within those structures, and monitoring the structure for condition changes during rescue and victim recovery operations. During his tenure with NE-TF1, he has deployed ​on numerous missions within the state of Nebraska and around the nation to assist communities that have been impacted by emergencies or disasters.

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