What are the responsibilities and job description for the Project Engineer position at Civil West Construction?
Job title
Project Engineer — Civil Construction
Job location type
In person
Job location
Salem, OR
About Civil West Construction
Civil West Construction LLC is a Salem, Oregon-based heavy civil prime contractor built around infrastructure work. We self-perform excavation and horizontal construction across a wide range of project types — site development, underground utilities, roadway, concrete, and public works — for ODOT, federal, state, county, and municipal owners, including prevailing-wage projects.
We don't box ourselves into one scope. If it's heavy civil infrastructure work in Oregon, we're built to bid it, run it, and close it out. This Project Engineer role sits inside a growing operating system for how we schedule, cost-track, document, and close our jobs.
The role
We're hiring a Project Engineer with roughly 2–3 years of civil construction experience to support our Project Managers and Superintendents on active jobs. You'll be the day-to-day owner of project paperwork, schedule updates, cost tracking, and field coordination — the person who keeps jobs organized so the PM can focus on strategy and the crew can focus on production.
This is an in-person role based out of our Salem office, with regular trips to job sites.
What you'll own
Schedule control
- Maintain and update project schedules in Excel and our schedule-control tool
- Publish weekly 2-3 week look-aheads for each active job
- Flag slippage early and support recovery planning with the PM and Superintendent
Submittals, RFIs, and change orders
- Log, route, and track submittals and RFIs with owners, engineers, and subs
- Draft change order requests with backup (quantities, unit prices, time impacts)
- Keep the submittal and RFI logs current so nothing sits idle
Job cost tracking (cost visibility, not P&L ownership)
- Track committed and actual project costs — labor hours, equipment hours, materials, subs, and rentals — against the budget
- Reconcile material deliveries and vendor invoices to POs and job cost codes
- Support quote-vs-actual tracking with our estimating and bookkeeping team; you're not owning gain/loss reporting, but you are making sure the numbers going in are clean
Field coordination and closeout
- Review foreman daily logs, chase missing information, and follow up on issues raised from the field
- Coordinate deliveries, inspections, utility locates, and ODOT/agency contacts
- Own project closeout: as-builts, O&M manuals, warranty documents, final lien releases, and punch list
What we're looking for
- 2–3 years of project engineer, assistant PM, or field engineer experience on civil construction projects (site work, underground utilities, concrete, ODOT/prevailing-wage a strong plus)
- Working knowledge of civil plans and specs, submittals, RFIs, and change orders
- Comfortable in Excel — you should be able to build and maintain a schedule, cost tracker, and quantity log without hand-holding
- Strong organization and follow-through; you close loops without being asked twice
- Good written communication — clear RFIs, clean emails, tight meeting notes
- Willing to be in the office daily and out on Oregon job sites when the work calls for it
- Valid driver's license and reliable transportation
Nice to have
- Degree or coursework in Civil Engineering, Construction Management, or a related field
- Experience with SharePoint, Microsoft 365, Bluebeam
- Prevailing-wage certified payroll familiarity
- OSHA 10 or 30
Compensation and benefits
- Pay: DOE (based on experience) COMPETITIVE PAY
- Full-time, in-person, Salem OR
- Benefits and PTO discussed during the interview process
- Direct path into a Project Manager role for the right person as Civil West grows
If interested and want more information feel free to message me. Look forward to hearing from you.
Benefits:
- Health insurance
- Paid time off
Work Location: In person