Chris Bowen started as the St. Paul District chief of construction in February. His responsibilities in this role include leading engineering division’s construction branch to successfully execute and administer the construction phase of district projects.
Bowen is from Glastonbury, Connecticut. He graduated as a mechanical engineer from the U.S. Military Academy, New York, and has a Masters in Business Administration from DeVry University, Illinois.
Right after his graduation from West Point, Bowen spent three years as a combat engineer in the U.S. Army stationed in Baumholder, Germany, and another two years as an anti-terrorism/force protection engineer in Heidelberg, Germany.
After he left the active duty military, he started working as a mechanical engineer with the Corps’ Baltimore District on the $1.7 billion National Geospatial Intelligence Agency's New Campus East at Ft. Belvoir, Virginia. Upon completion of that project, he relocated to Jacksonville District to work on the Herbert Hoover Dike Rehabilitation, where the Corps is rehabilitating a 143-mile long dam surrounding Lake Okeechobee.
From there, he served as the resident engineer for the Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg Resident Office with the Corps’ Europe District. After two years, he moved to Israel to work as the area engineer for the Foreign Military Funding program to provide military construction services to the nation of Israel.
“The Army Corps of Engineers is probably one of the most diverse organizations in existence,” Bowen said, when asked why he chose to work for the Corps. “The Corps’ missions take place all over the world and includes design, construction, permitting, recreation, power generation, real estate, research and development, classified projects, unclassified projects, work for the U.S., work for other governments, humanitarian projects, consulting/training services, disaster response and COVID treatment facility conversions. We employ people from every walk of life worldwide and work as a team to successfully complete missions that no other agency could accomplish and we do this on a daily basis.”
Bowen said his plans for his new position include efficiently aligning construction branch with the proper staffing size and locations to be able to meet the growing construction workload the district is experiencing. “We have a significant workload in Fargo and a growing workload in the St. Paul area,” he said, “so we are trying to position ourselves to most effectively administer all of these projects.”
Outside of work, Bowen has a number of hobbies, including spending time with his family, wood/metal working, snow and water sports, robotics, real estate investing and crypto currency.
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