On duty — City hires Dietrich as city engineer

After a few years of relying on a part-time employee, the city of Newcastle once again has a full-time engineer.

Since September, Steve Dietrich has filled the role, bringing 40 years of experience in the engineering and environmental fields.

Dietrich began his career in his native Virginia, where he worked as a consultant and state employee for nearly two decades. In 2010, he relocated to Cheyenne, taking a job with the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality. About four years later, Dietrich moved to Green River, where he spent about five years doing environmental work for a soda ash plant. In 2019, he and his wife, Rebecca, resettled in Oregon, where he worked for that state’s Department of Environmental Quality and later for a local agency.

“Then in 2024, my wife and I decided we needed to move back to Wyoming,” Dietrich said.

That decision would prove beneficial to his new community, although it took awhile for the stars to align and allow Dietrich to assume his new position.

After the 2022 resignation of the previous full-time engineer, Mike Moore, the city hired Newcastle native Chuck Bartlett as a part-time interim city engineer. Prior to his hiring, Bartlett had retired from the position of public works director in Saratoga. According to Newcastle Public Works Director Greg Stumpff, Bartlett learned that his hometown needed a city engineer.

“He found out we were short an engineer and that I was kind of floundering at the beginning with the projects we had going on and with trying to learn how to get funding to pay for everything,” Stumpff said. “Considering there were millions of dollars involved, I wanted somebody who I knew could help, and Chuck offered to help us until we found a (permanent) engineer.”

In an interview with the News Letter Journal, Newcastle Mayor Tyrel Owens expressed gratitude for Bartlett’s service.

“He could have retired, but he chose to help us because he knew we needed it. I can only say good things about Chuck Bartlett. He really helped the city while being a fantastic professional,” Owens said.

During the city’s search for a full-time engineer, a mutual acquaintance of Stumpff and Dietrich, Craig McOmie, mentioned to Stumpff that Dietrich had moved to Newcastle and might be a candidate. Stumpff then asked McOmie, a program manager for the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality and a close friend of Dietrich, to let him know of the opportunity.

“Craig didn’t say anything to Steve, but what he did do was introduce Steve and Rebecca to me the next time he was in town,” Stumpff said.

Coincidentally, the Dietrichs had moved into the house behind the Stumpffs — the same home where Stumpff’s grandfather-in-law once lived.

After moving to Newcastle, Dietrich took a position with the Wyoming Department of Transportation, working in Sundance as the resident engineer on construction projects.

“I worked at WYDOT for about a year and a half and then decided to give the city of Newcastle a try,” he said.

Since accepting the job of city engineer, Dietrich has adapted well to the role.

“Steve has been a fantastic hire,” Owens said. “He has a really great attitude, and he is working really well with the public. I’m just super excited to have him on board.”

Stumpff echoed the sentiment.

“I was fortunate to get to know and socialize with Steve prior to working with him. I have come to know him as a likable person who wants to solve problems and improve what we have,” he said.

Dietrich credited Stumpff with sharing this aim.

“Greg has a pretty ambitious goal of trying to get all the water and sewer in town upgraded in the next 10 years. That’s a lofty goal, especially when you have around 17 miles of sewer to take care of in the city of Newcastle,” he said.

Despite the challenging nature of that endeavor, Dietrich said he is excited by the prospect of leaving the town’s infrastructure better off for future generations. He pointed to the city’s recent efforts to acquire financial resources to pay for such an undertaking.

“Newcastle is doing a pretty good job of trying to find ways to get financing or grant monies to try to keep moving projects ahead,” he said.

As previously reported in the News Letter Journal, the Newcastle City Council recently adopted a new strategy for securing project funding by hiring Beth Blackwell, a grant and loan specialist, to write and manage grants for the city.

While Dietrich has not been on the job for long, he has already gained an appreciation for the unique challenges the city engineer faces.

“From one day to the next, I can tell you that no two days seem to be the same, which kind of keeps it interesting,” he said.

Dietrich recognizes the importance of healthy infrastructure to the economic well-being of the city. He hopes that providing an engineering perspective to city leaders will help them make the most efficient and beneficial use of the resources available, thereby making Newcastle a consideration for businesses looking for a municipality to set up shop.

“We need to ask, ‘What new industry or what new business can come here? What do the citizens need as far as housing?’ And we need to try to stay ahead of that,” he said. “Those are challenges that not only Newcastle faces but that are faced nationwide. Some places are doing a much better job of trying to anticipate and prepare than others, but I think Newcastle’s heading in the right direction.”