Joint use program manager brings an unusual skill set— and a Metallica soundtrack—to utility program management.
By Karen Heim
There’s a good chance that if you walk into Stephanie Johnston’s office at Northern Wasco County PUD, you’ll hear Metallica playing. If you stop to chat, you’ll catch the unmistakable accent of someone who grew up in Southeast Arkansas, a drawl that sounds decidedly different from the typical Pacific Northwest voice.
For Stephanie, NWCPUD’s utility joint use program manager, being a bit unexpected comes naturally.
Stephanie grew up on a farm. Her family’s operation included rice, soybeans, corn, oats, cattle, and horses—it was the kind of place where hard work wasn’t just encouraged, it was required.
“There are too many memorable experiences to mention, but their cumulative impact taught me to have confidence in myself and a well-developed get-the-job-done attitude,” Stephanie says.
That farm-kid determination has served her well through a career path that most people wouldn’t see coming.
Stephanie’s education journey took her from the University of Arkansas at Monticello to Arkansas State University in Jonesboro, where she earned degrees in animal science, and then to the University of Missouri at Columbia for a degree in fisheries and wildlife with a biology minor. It’s an unusual combination of credentials, and one that led her to an even more unusual career: wildlife rabies biologist with USDA Wildlife Services.
Yes, before she was thinking about utility poles and power lines, Stephanie was dealing with rabid wildlife.
“Being a wildlife biologist was probably the most formative of all my job experiences,” she says. “Working in wildlife damage management, I learned to work closely with a very diverse public to help mitigate human/wildlife conflict.”
It’s not the typical path to utility work, but then again, Stephanie isn’t a typical utility professional.
The shift from wildlife biology to the utility industry came in 2015, during a periodic crisis that federal employees know all too well.
“As a federal employee going through the experience of previous government shutdowns and stressing over federal funding negotiations, I wanted job security,” Stephanie says.
A job posting at a cooperative in Arizona caught her attention. It combined environmental work with joint use management, and it offered the stability she was looking for. There was a family connection, too.
“My mother retired from a small electric cooperative, so the interest was already there,” she says.
Stephanie made the leap, trading wildlife conflicts for a different kind of coordination challenge: managing the relationships between electric utilities and communication companies.
In September 2024, she brought that expertise to Northern Wasco County PUD.
Stephanie has a straightforward way of explaining joint use management.
“Joint use refers to the sharing of a utility pole by both the electric utility company and one or more communication companies,” she says. “The electric utility is usually the pole owner, and the communication companies rent space on each pole for attachments.”
The next time you’re sitting at a stoplight, look up at a utility pole.
“The easiest description is that the black colored lines attached to the middle of the pole are telephone, cable TV, and fiber optic cables,” Stephanie says. “The electrical lines are the silver lines located at the top of the pole.”
It might sound simple, but managing this arrangement is anything but.
Stephanie’s days are filled with tracking construction activities, notifying PUD crews and communication companies about low-hanging or damaged lines, coordinating attachment transfers between poles, and conducting inspections and surveys for new attachment applications.
The job has a lot of moving parts, and keeping everything running smoothly requires the same skills she developed in wildlife management: patience, attention to detail, and the ability to work with diverse groups toward a common goal.
Stephanie says the biggest challenge is keeping the lines of communication open—pun intended.
She’s talking about coordinating workflows between the PUD and communication companies and making sure everyone follows the standards set by the National Electrical Safety Code.
When she’s not managing utility poles, Stephanie stays connected to the outdoor pursuits she’s loved for years. She enjoys hunting, fishing, rock hounding, and woodworking, though since arriving in Oregon, there hasn’t been much time to explore local spots yet.
Stephanie’s favorite hunting memories come from pursuing deer and turkey in Arizona, and she still thinks fondly of flyfishing in the hill creeks of Northern Arkansas.
About her taste in music: Metallica is her go-to, with Rob Zombie running a close second. It’s not exactly what one might expect from someone managing utility infrastructure, but that’s kind of the point. Stephanie brings her whole self to work: the farm-kid work ethic, the wildlife biologist’s eye for safety and coordination, the Southern directness and, yes, the heavy metal soundtrack.
For Northern Wasco County PUD’s customer-owners, Stephanie’s presence means something important. The utility poles that line our streets and bring power and communication to our homes are managed by someone who understands complex systems, values safety, and knows how to coordinate between different groups with competing priorities.
Whether Stephanie learned those skills on an Arkansas farm or tracking rabid wildlife across diverse communities, the result is the same: someone who can handle the intricate choreography of keeping the lights on and the lines of communication open.
Stephanie’s journey from Arkansas farms to wildlife biology to utility program management proves something public power has always understood: There’s no single path to serving your community. Sometimes the best person for the job is the one who took the scenic route to get there, picking up unexpected skills and perspectives along the way.
And if there’s a little Metallica playing in the background while they work? Even better.
