Published March 27, 2020
MELROSE — Elena Proakis Ellis will be the first woman to lead the city’s public works department.
This week, the City Council unanimously approved an order sent earlier by Mayor Paul Brodeur asking to name the current assistant DPW director to the top post. She becomes the DPW director on March 30.
Proakis Ellis has been the city engineer and assistant DPW director since 2015.
She replaces interim Director Richard Stinson, who was appointed in September to fill in for a few months after John Scenna left to become head of the Lynnfield Center Water District. Stinson was formerly the longtime DPW director in Wakefield, retiring last year.
Proakis Ellis, a Wakefield resident who lives in Greenwood, earned her bachelor’s degree from Wesleyan University in Connecticut and her master’s in Environmental Engineering from the University of California-Berkeley. She is currently a member of Wakefield’s Advisory Board of Public Works.
Proakis Ellis has worked for Camp Dresser & McKee, CDM Smith and for the town of Concord’s Water and Sewer Division as its Operations manager.
Her current duties as assistant DPW director in Melrose include managing the engineering of all public works functions like water, sewer, drainage, roadways, sidewalks, traffic and facilities; overseeing capital infrastructure planning, design, construction, funding and grants; bidding, awarding and overseeing numerous annual contracts for services and study; managing compliance and reporting with water, sewer and stormwater regulatory requirements; performing technical reviews of new development and redevelopment projects; and serving as chair of the city’s Traffic Commission and as member of the Melrose Water and Sewer Rate Advisory Committee.
