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Yazdan “Yaz” Emrani was recently sworn in as the newest member of the Board of Directors for Metropolitan Water District (MWD) of Southern California. Emrani is the director of Public Works for the city of San Fernando and is also the city’s engineer.
His responsibilities as part of the MWD board includes serving on four Metropolitan boards including: Audit and Ethics Committee; Communications and Legislation Committee; Facilities Naming Ad Hoc Committee; and the Organization, Personnel and Technology Committee. Emrani is succeeding San Fernando Mayor Sylvia Ballin on the 38-member MWD board. Ballin had served on the MWD board since 2007.
Emrani has 30 years of both public and private sector civil and environmental engineering. He earned a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Syracuse University (New York) and a master’s degree in civil engineering from University of Maryland at College Park. His experience includes the planning, design and construction management of a variety of infrastructure improvement projects.
An advocate for investment in public infrastructure, Emrani is active in the American Society of Civil Engineers and helped develop the infrastructure report card for California. He has also been involved with wastewater collection system planning and design, and has worked closely with the State Water Resources Control Board in conducting educational seminars for cities and public agencies.
Emrani began his career as a design engineer for consulting engineering firm KCI Technologies in Maryland. After moving to Orange County, he co-founded an engineering consulting practice, Advanced Infrastructure Management, in 2002. He has taught engineering classes at the University of California, Irvine (UCI) and served on the advisory board for the UCI Dean of Engineering.
Representing the city of San Fernando on the Upper Los Angeles River Steering Committee, Emrani was recently elected vice chair of the committee. In this position, he serves as a liaison to the Greater Los Angeles County Integrated Regional Water Management Leadership Council. The council provides guidance to address the water resources needs of the region.
Additionally, he is active and has held leadership positions with the American Public Works Association, California Water Environment Association and the Water Environment Federation. A native of Iran, he was raised in upstate New York. Emrani and his wife, Bahareh, live in Orange County and have two children.
