City Manager Leadership Award goes to Senior Planner Nancy Huynh

The City Manager Leadership Award Winner for the month of August is Senior Planner Nancy Huynh.

“Nancy works on some of the City’s most high-profile projects and because of that I’ve been witness to her skills, innovation and creativity,” City Manager Lori Ann Farrell Harrison said. “She is a valued member of our planning team, a trusted colleague and a rising star in the organization. I congratulate her on this well-earned honor.”

Huynh is a valued member of the Economic and Development Services Department. She joined the City of Costa Mesa as an Associate Planner in 2018 and was promoted to Senior Planner earlier this year.

She established herself as a leader in the Department early on by assisting some of the most challenging customers at the public counter with professionalism and a smile, while eagerly accepting several very difficult projects. Huynh is the project planner for One Metro West, a mixed-use project that includes office, retail, and over 1,000 housing units proposed next to SoCo.

After two years, an Environmental Impact Report, hundreds of public comments, and several public hearings, the City Council approved the project in June of this year. One Metro West is the first project headed to a vote of the people under the voter-approved initiative, Measure Y.

As if that wasn’t enough, Huynh was instrumental in the preparation of Measure Q and the City’s retail cannabis sales ordinance, which was a result of the passage of Measure Q last November by over 65% of Costa Mesa voters.

Following meetings with the Council’s Cannabis Ad Hoc Committee and the local cannabis business industry and after several iterations of the new regulations, the City’s retail cannabis permitting program successfully launched earlier this month with nearly 20 applications received on the first day.

Through it all, she always has a positive attitude. Huynh is perpetually smiling and enthusiastically helping her fellow staff members or customers at the counter or on the phones.  Despite an intense workload, Huynh has also taken on the role of “social coordinator” for the Department, always taking the time to celebrate her colleagues, organizing office decorations, food, and gifts for birthdays, retirements, new babies and more.

Prior to joining Costa Mesa, Huynh worked a variety of jobs reflecting her interest in planning and sustainability and food, including working as a tour guide at Tanaka Farms, working on a food truck and working as an Associate Planner in the private sector for over four years.

Huynh received her bachelor’s degree in Urban Studies with a minor in Global Sustainability and her master’s degree in Urban and Regional Planning from UCI.