ALEXANDRIA, VIRGINIA. Lillian Almodovar, IWR Senior Manager and Deputy Director, received the Meritorious Civilian Service Award from LTG Thomas Bostick, USACE Commander and Chief of Engineers, upon her retirement, effective June 2, 2013. A ceremony to recognize and honor Ms. Almodovar’s career accomplishments was held on May 30, 2013, where IWR Director Bob Pietrowsky presented the award, along with a ceremonial U.S. flag flown over the IWR complex, her certificate and service pin.
Ms. Almodovar joined IWR as a manager of Enterprise Group W in April 2005. In January 2008, she assumed the responsibilities of Senior Manager/Deputy Director for the Institute. Her responsibilities included overall program development and integration, management of the Institute, and development of strategic initiatives. At her retirement ceremony, Director Pietrowsky emphasized that “Lillian’s role as IWR Senor Manager/Deputy Director was crucial to the accomplishment of the Institute’s broad range of water resources missions, and that her superb performance over the last eight years was absolutely essential to virtually all of IWR’s successes.”
She distinguished herself within the Corps as a strong advocate for recruitment and advancement of women and minorities, particularly Hispanics. She served as the PIANC USA Latin American liaison. She also provided valuable input to developing the memorandum of understanding between the Hispanics Engineers National Achievement Awards Conference (HENAAC) and USACE, which has opened the door to significant improvements and advances for the recruitment of Hispanics. In 2010, she received the HENAAC National Award for Professional Achievement.
Her work as a PIANC USA Latin American liaison (and a member of PIANC’s International Co-Operation Commission (CoCom)), included leading a U.S. Section PIANC effort to organize a series of November 2012 seminars and training activities in Bogota and Cartagena to support the new PIANC Colombia section.
Ms. Almodovar began her career with the Puerto Rico Planning Group at the San Juan Area Office of the Jacksonville District, which was created to address water resources development needs of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and the United States Virgin Islands. She developed the economic analysis for numerous planning studies, including developing tools and procedures to address the unique characteristics of the islands.
From Puerto Rico, Ms. Almodovar moved on to USACE South Atlantic Division, where she served as a regional economist reviewing planning studies prepared by five districts in the division. From Atlantic Division she moved to USACE Headquarters, where she assumed a position with the Planning Community of Practice. She was responsible for development of national policies and procedures for formulation and evaluation of water resource development projects. As manager of the Guidance Maintenance Program, she led the team that produced a comprehensive revision of the Planning Guidance Notebook (ER-1105-2-100) published in 2000.
In addition to many colleagues who attended from IWR, others attending the retirement ceremony included Bruce Carlson, Harry Kitch, Janice Rasgus and Rennie Sherman from USACE Headquarters; Glenda Ashford from USACE South Atlantic Division; and other former IWR and Headquarters team members.