Barney Austin has worked in the field of water resources for more than 23 years. With a Bachelor’s degree in Agricultural Engineering and a PhD in Civil Engineering, he specializes in water supply planning, hydrology, hydraulics, and environmental flows. He has lived and worked in Canada and England, and has been in the United States for the last 17 years. The former director of the Surface Water Division of the Texas Water Development Board, he was an active participant in the development of state water plans in Texas, Oklahoma and California, and oversaw nine surface water programs. Barney has managed many large projects and diverse groups of people, successfully bridging the gap between technical and non-technical stakeholders as well as the private and public sectors. He now heads up Aqua Strategies Inc.
License #100370 (Texas)

Tim Osting is a professional engineer working from the field and from the office on water resources topics since 1996. Specializing in hydrology, hydraulics, water quality and environmental flows, Tim has successfully designed and implemented complex, multi-agency, multi-year, multi-disciplinary field data collection and modeling programs to answer water supply policy and permitting decisions.
Tim collaborates with resource agencies, university researchers and stakeholder groups on complicated water resources projects involving watersheds, rivers, lakes and coasts. Tim strives to increase understanding of environmental systems by using grounded field data and well-interpreted modeling of water quality, water quantity, sediments, and multi-dimensional hydrodynamics.
License #91931 (Texas)

Frank Schalla is a professional engineer who has worked in the field of water resources for over 8 years. He specializes in using scientific methods to answer difficult questions related to water availability, water supply planning, and hydrology and hydraulics across Texas and Oklahoma. He works on large to small scale projects involving watersheds, lakes, coasts and rivers. Before working at Aqua Strategies Frank worked internationally, developing and managing rural water projects in West Africa and Central America. His international experience of working directly with community members and local leaders has driven his approach to understanding and addressing clients’ needs. He holds a master’s degree in Environmental and Water Resources Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin.

License # 132038 (Texas); # 30723 (Oklahoma)

Elise Dominey is our Office Administrator and Bookkeeper. Elise is a certified legal secretary and has had various Office Manager, executive assistant, administrative, receptionist and accounting duties, through companies including PricewaterhouseCoopers in Dallas and RE/MAX in Austin. Elise formerly worked for the Dripping Springs Water Supply Corporation as their Corporate Bookkeeper, handling payroll, financial reporting, and accounts payable and receivable.

Justin is Professional Engineer and Certified Floodplain Manager with experience in a variety of water resources engineering projects, including hydrologic and hydraulic modeling, water availability studies, and watershed planning. He previously worked for a large engineering consulting firm on flood modeling and dam assessment projects across Texas, and also had the opportunity to work under FEMA’s Public Assistance program following Hurricane Harvey. Justin holds Master’s degrees from the University of Texas at Austin in Environmental and Water Resources Engineering and Global Policy Studies. He was raised in Botswana and Zimbabwe, and has a continuing interest in both the engineering and policy aspects of international development. TBPE EIT Number: 55146.

Georganna is a registered landscape architect focusing on ecological restoration solutions for streams, wetlands and coastal environments. Her Master’s in Landscape Architecture combined with her Bachelor’s in Mining Engineering informs her passion for “engineering with nature”, the practice of incorporating natural and nature-based features into her projects to enhance their sustainability and resilience. She prepares planning documents, permit applications, construction drawings, and supervises construction activities. As project manager on multiple, high-profile projects, Georganna has helped diverse stakeholder groups find common ground through integrating public comments in her plans and designs to achieve multiple benefits and community support. She is currently serving on a Corps of Engineers workgroup tasked with writing the guidance manual for the incorporation of “engineering with nature” principles on all future federal civil works projects.

David has diverse experience with environmental and energy management consulting over his 30-year career, which has been informed by his multidisciplinary degree in Environmental Science. He has worked with both government and private industry to ensure projects move forward with early consideration and incorporation of sustainable and resilient design elements. Governmental clients include Corps of Engineers, Army, Air Force and Bureau of Land Management, as well as various state agencies overseeing water resources, energy development, hazardous waste sites and energy efficiency. His private sector experience includes wind and solar renewable energy development, electric transmission, oil & gas pipelines, and transportation projects. David enjoys working with diverse technical teams, community stakeholders, regulators and client representatives to achieve successful outcomes.

Paul Southard is a professional geologist with a background in hydrology and geomorphology. He has 3 years of experience working with landowners, municipalities, states and other organizations to creatively solve water and sediment issues on the computer and in the field. At Aqua Strategies, Paul primarily works on projects involving groundwater, water quality modeling, sediment transport modeling and water availability modeling. He started his career at the Massachusetts Geological Survey and, prior to joining Aqua Strategies, worked at a non-profit private research lab in Texas focusing primarily on hydrologic and groundwater modeling projects. He holds a Masters of Science in Geosciences from the University of Texas at Austin. Paul is passionate about using environmental models as a scientific tool to solve complex earth science problems, as well as making those tools free and open source.

License #15214 (TX)

Mike Vielleux has over three decades of water resources management, flood mapping and prediction, H&H modeling, drainage design and environmental consulting experience, including 11 years with the Texas Water Development Board. He has initiated strategies to create policy frameworks in which he stood up data collection initiatives across agencies and stakeholders and interpreted and reported findings that informed policy directives. Mike has consulted on international water policy development in Mexico and engineered relevant pure water solutions through an international venture in Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Qatar. He has extensive experience in water engineering as a private, government and industry consultant. He brings expertise in residential and commercial water management, environmental needs, sustainability, flood risk and mitigation, system design and construction, instrumentation, data generation, modeling, and deployment of appropriate technologies. Mike’s latest achievement is 2D HEC-RAS flood modeling using time and spatially varied rainfall data. Mike has applied his unique skills in troubleshooting and optimizing to satisfy the diverse needs of a variety of stakeholders at site, watershed, and larger scales. His specialty is engineered solutions that are innovative, but grounded in common sense, promoting environmental quality, water conservation, land use planning, and sustainable engineering.

License #108182 (Texas); #32210 (Colorado)

Peter Zamora is classically trained in groundwater hydrology but has actively engaged in geoscientific research since 2001 which includes work in groundwater and surface water flow, quality, and quantity modeling, sedimentology, geochemistry, and geohazards. His main interest is in groundwater-surface water interactions and how they influence the quantity and quality of surface and subsurface water near streams, estuaries, and the coastal ocean. His research approach involves the use of field observations, geophysical and geochemical techniques, as well as numerical simulations in addressing hydrogeologic and geoscience-related questions.