JOINT BASE SAN ANTONIO-LACKLAND, Texas – Meet Blaine Kohpay. Kohpay is the project manager for Air Force Civil Engineer Center’s facilities engineering directorate at AFIMSC. He oversees large facility sustainment, restoration and modernization airfield projects.
Q: Briefly tell us why you joined the Air Force or, if a civilian employee, civil service?
A: I started here as a government contractor working as construction manager with about 30 years of experience in the airfield construction industry. After four or five years, the next rung on the ladder was to become a government civilian. I made the switch to broaden what I could do within the Department of War and AFIMSC.
Q: What are you most excited to do when you come to work? What are you most proud to do/complete?
A: What gets me excited is learning new things with the government. A lot of folks here are lifelong government employees. Coming from industry, I worked on a lot of government projects and interacted with AFCEC outside of being a government civilian, so it's a challenge and exciting for me to continue to learn the government way of doing things because it's completely different from industry. We have a lot of great folks in our branch who have a lot of great knowledge of how the government works and they've been really good to me to show me the ropes. Even after working here at AFCEC as a civilian and a contractor for about nine years, there's always something new to learn.
Q: What is the most unique thing about your job?
A: The government is very unique in their acronyms, coming from industry to the government, I wasn't familiar with that. Every day I learn a new acronym.
Q: Why are you and your team important to the Air Force/Space Force enterprise/your customers?
A: My team and I deal with something that is to me, the heartbeat of the Air Force, and that is our airfield paving projects. Without our airfields, we don't have anywhere for the planes to land and to take off. So that's very important to the Air Force, and that's why I feel like my team and I are very important in that aspect. With our knowledge of airfield construction, we bring a lot to the table as far as helping the Air Force with our airfield paving projects around the country and all the different Air Force bases.
Q: Describe a project/event you and your team worked on recently that gave you a great sense of accomplishment:
A: That would be the Travis Runway project at Travis Air Force Base. It was a complete removal and replacement of the runway. We faced a lot of pressure because the base has an annual air show in April, and needed the runway completed by then. It was a huge push for us and the contractor to get this project accomplished. The project started in 2022, and there were some issues up front with the project, but we were able to meet the deadline. Travis Air Force Base was very grateful for everyone’s hard work. I was coined by the base commander for a job well done. It was a big accomplishment.
Q: Complete this sentence … I support our Airmen, Guardians and their families by …
A: “…serving alongside our military members. I've not been in the military, myself, but I find it a pleasure every day to serve and support our Airmen and Guardians and their families as a government civilian and to help enable the mission that we’re trying to do every day.”
Q: What do you like to do outside of work (hobbies, family time, special talent, etc.)?
A: My wife and I like to travel. She’s a teacher, and every year since COVID, we take a 10-day road trip to visit different parts of the U.S. My wife is a big baseball fan who grew up in the St. Louis area. After the first year, we implemented the first destination in our road trip was going to be wherever the Cardinals were playing baseball. We’d buy tickets to see the baseball game, and that would be our first destination on our road trip. We also started collecting medallions from every baseball stadium we visited in America, and we're up to about 15 different stadiums. We have a magnetic display map of the of the United States on our refrigerator and every different state that we visit, we add it, and eventually we’ll build the whole United States.
Q: Is there anything else you’d like to add which might help people understand the importance of what you do for the Department of the Air Force?
It’s project management and dealing with overseeing the large FSRM projects. Again, I specialize in airfield paving and construction, those are the only projects that I focus on.