Toowoomba Regional Council engineer, Blaise Shann, has been named the national Institute of Public Works Engineering Australasia (IPWEA) Public Works Leader of the Year 2025 at the International Public Works Conference in Sydney this week.
Mayor, Geoff McDonald congratulated Mr Shann (pictured) on his achievement, saying it was a thoroughly deserved individual honour, while also reflecting highly on his various teams’ performance and collaboration.
Council Construction and Maintenance (Infrastructure Services) portfolio spokesperson, Councillor Carol Taylor, also praised Mr Shann’s professionalism, noting that the national award capped his 2024 award as the IPWEA Queensland and Northern Territory Public Works Professional of the Year.
“The IPWEA national awards are the pinnacle for the industry where the leading professionals and projects are named in recognition of the benefits they deliver for communities,” Cr Taylor said.
“Toowoomba Regional Council can be rightly proud of Blaise’s achievements which reflect well on the organisation.
“Blaise has shown outstanding stewardship of Council’s recently completed and largest project to date, the 2022 Flood Recovery Program. This was a Region-wide $300 million Flood Recovery Program, which was jointly funded by the Australian and Queensland Government Disaster Recovery Funding Arrangements (DRFA).
“Blaise’s leadership skills came to the fore on the Program thanks to his ability to assemble a program management team comprising five consultancies, as well as a program delivery team consisting of three internal teams and two Tier One contractors.
“In addition to his professional acumen, Blaise exhibits Council’s values to respect and treat his colleagues as equals and always contributes to the team’s outcome. He willingly tackles all tasks and leads by example.
“These qualities will stand Blaise in good stead in his latest role as the project delivery manager for our Cressbrook Dam Safety Improvement Project,” she said.
