State of Maryland

Principal Planner is the managerial level of work directing or supervising the work of professional planners, engineers, consultants in land use, environmental, community development or transportation planning and other planning related specialties. Employees in this class are responsible for managing one or more planning programs. Employees supervise lower-level Planners and planning consultants.

The employee receives managerial supervision from a higher-level administrator.

The Principal Planner is differentiated from the Planner V in that the Principal Planner is responsible for managerial oversight for a division of professional planners and other planning staff while the Planner V functions as a first-line supervisor over lower-level professional planners.

Directs and coordinates all activities of one or more planning programs and formulates program goals and objectives;

Initiates and develops comprehensive and regionally and/or functionally oriented programs and studies health and educational planning, land use planning, natural resource planning, transportation planning, crime, delinquency, housing, unemployment, and other social or economic problems;

Approves scopes of studies, research and statistical methods, and field work activities to be undertaken in connection with planning projects;

Prepares and manages the personnel and financial resources of the program(s);

Maintains contact with State, federal, regional, and local officials engaged in the various aspects of planning as well as with representatives of the private sector having similar responsibilities or interests;

Supervises the preparation of applications for grants of financial assistance from federal and private sources and directs negotiations regarding such applications with the granting agencies concerned;

Supervises the updating and revision of the regional, State, and/or functional agency plans as required by State law;

Participates in the negotiation of agreements or contracts between the planning agency and government agencies in a region, such work activity to include State, federal and local units of government;

Makes presentations on plans, proposals, and activities before civic groups and various agencies and organizations;

Oversees the collection, creation, maintenance, distribution and plotting of GIS data and the preparation of maps and data analysis tasks including the production of graphic and tabular data;

Supervises and trains professional, paraprofessional, and clerical personnel engaged in complex planning projects or programs;

Perform other related duties.