Brandon Johnson looks through his computer Monday morning at the recently opened SCJ Alliance branch in Centralia. Johnson is the site leader for the Lacey-based firm.
SCJ Alliance Consulting Services is located in downtown Centralia at 212 North Tower Ave.
In anticipation of economic growth coming to north Lewis County, the SCJ Alliance has opened a satellite office in Centralia to provide design services to the area.
Lewis County native Brandon Johnson is the site principal for the Lacey-based company. He said the business provides civil and transportation design services as well as land use planning to municipalities and private citizens.
“It’s always been a career goal of mine to bring a SCJ satellite office down to Centralia, Chehalis,” he said. “We’re just excited to be down here and feel that the community is on the cusp of some growth.”
The Centralia branch opened in December and is working with the Chehalis School District to help design two new schools. The business also works with Centralia College and is drawing up plans for a new interchange on Interstate 5 north of the Harrison Road exit, which would serve a planned industrial park.
Johnson said he sees the possibility for coming investments in north Lewis and south Thurston counties in the near future due to large amounts of undeveloped land and sewer and water connections.
SCJ Alliance was formed in 2006, shortly before the Great Recession, and Johnson said the business spent much of that time positioning themselves for success during the recovery.
Over the past few years, Johnson said, the Olympia market has improved dramatically, and he and the SCJ Alliance anticipate that influx of activity will continue down the Interstate 5 corridor.
The business hopes to get in at the ground floor of any coming economic growth in the area.
“We have always looked at the Lewis County market and thought that there was a lot of potential,” he said.
Their services include designing roadways and other traffic infrastructure, sewer and water systems as well as land use, which generally includes accounting for wetland and river regulation compliance.
Johnson said most properties in Lewis County either contain wetlands, are in floodplains or drain into river systems, all of which is regulated by environmental law.
“We navigate all those permit requirements,” he said.
The Centralia office has four full-time employees, with other employees who rotate through from the Lacey office when they are needed.
Pictures of past projects hang from the walls on large canvases, and Johnson hopes to bring some of that development to the area.
“There’s just a lot of good things happening in the community right now,” he said.
The SCJ Alliance will be having a ribbon cutting ceremony, courtesy of the Chehalis-Centralia Chamber of Commerce, on Thursday at 12:15 p.m.
