| Profession: | Councilman Blais serves as President and CEO of Blais & Associates, a professional grant management firm. Founded by his wife Destin in early 2000, Blais & Associates has earned a reputation of being the premier grant writing firms and is actively sought by many local government agencies throughout California. Mr. Blais left ABS Consulting in 2007 to support the continued growth Blais & Associates has enjoyed since its inception. Prior to joining Blais & Associates, Mr. Blais was the General Manager of State and Local Government Operations for ABS Consulting, an international engineering firm specializing in risk reduction and loss-control. In this role, Mr. Blais led a team of professionals in helping federal, state, and local governments in all aspects of emergency management. He was responsible for developing a vision and operating philosophy for the team, and promoting positive morale, and espirit de corps. He served as a member of the ABS Group President’s executive team, which developed the company’s vision, goals, and budget for its over 1,100 employees.
Some of his more notable efforts included working with communities in Turkey following the Marmara earthquake, leading the efforts to develop a flood loss estimation software tool for FEMA, and working with U.S. communities such as Grand Forks, North Dakota, Princeville, North Carolina, and several small communities in Missouri. Mr. Blais began his career in the aerospace industry, working for Lockheed Martin and McDonnell Douglas. He earned his B.S. in aerospace engineering from California State Polytechnic University-Pomona in 1984. While at McDonnell Douglas, he was responsible for working with nearly 3,000 engineers involved in the design and development of the MD-80 (now called the Boeing 717). Due to his hard work and drive, Mr. Blais was assigned as the Ship Captain for the LTU MD-11, which required ensuring that all production issues were addressed to the German customer’s satisfaction. In March 1994, following the California Northridge earthquake, Mr. Blais translated his knowledge of management, engineering, and product delivery to the emergency management field. Mr. Blais was hired as a senior project engineer for EQE International working with the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Management during the recovery process. From this experience realized his true calling was working to make the next disaster event uneventful. Within the emergency management field, Mr. Blais has earned a reputation as a leader and a forward-thinker. After personally witnessing the losses from Hurricane Katrina, he developed a white paper which boldly laid out a new approach for involving the private sector and non-profit organizations following a disaster. He is an Emergency Management Accreditation Program Commissioner, and is a member of the National Emergency Management Association, International Association of Emergency Managers, and Association of State Flood Plain Managers. On the political front, on January 1, 2000, a member of the incorporation team, Mr. Blais was elected to the first city council of Rancho Santa Margarita. In 2004, Mr. Blais served as Mayor. His accomplishments as councilman and mayor included creating a non-profit foundation to aid the city in obtaining funding for the construction of a community center. After construction was completed, the foundation remained in existence to manage the activities at the center and locate funds to help offset program costs.
Mr. Blais also created an Economic Development Committee to ensure that the city was responsive to the needs of the business community. Because of this effort, Mr. Blais received the first “Commerce Award” in 2006 from the South Orange County Regional Chambers of Commerce for going “above and beyond” normal duties to improve the economic development climate in South Orange County.
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