Getting this region’s infrastructure up to snuff is keeping Jones & Stokes busy. Based in Sacramento, Calif., the Bellevue office is the firm’s largest satellite, with 45 people.

“We probably have a good third of our business in energy services,” says Bill Staeger, Jones & Stokes’ energy business group leader.

“We do a great deal of work for the Bonneville Power Administration on transmission lines, visual analysis and wetlands,” says Staeger. “That’s going to be a major part of our future with the $2.3 billion worth of effort they’re going to expend over the next 10 years.”

Right now, Jones & Stokes is working on a 70-mile transmission line from the John Day Dam to McNary Dam. They’ve also done a good deal of wind farm work for the burgeoning wind power business in the Columbia River basin.

Jones & Stokes is also the site location contractor for the state Energy Facilities Siting Commission. That work includes analysis of the controversial gas-fired Sumas Two power plant near the Canadian border. The firm is also busy on the endangered species front. “The biggest ESA project we have right now is working with King County on a Habitat Conservation Plan for wastewater, covering all their current and future activities,” said Rick Oestman, a Jones & Stokes fisheries biologist.

Another third of their work comes from transportation projects, including a contract with the Washington State Department of Transportation.

Recently the firm has made inroads into toxicology services and cultural resources and historic preservation planning.

To keep up with the work, the office has moved to a new building in Bellevue. Jones & Stokes expects staff growth of 10 percent in the near future.