Chelsea Kelly-Reif

Engineering leader

Chelsea Kelly‑Reif

I lead teams, write code, and build public systems people can trust.

  • 10+years building public systems
  • BilingualEnglish and Spanish delivery
  • Hands-onarchitecture and engineering leadership

For the last decade, I've turned policy into secure, accessible software across workforce, health, energy, and social services.

See what I've builtTalk with me

Davis, California · Remote / Hybrid

About

I lead engineering teams and still write code.

In my current role, I lead engineering managers and individual contributors delivering public-interest digital services. I stay close to architecture, accessibility, reliability, and team development.

My work spans full-stack delivery, bilingual access, standards-based data exchange, cloud operations, and services that turn complex public programs into usable software.

Before joining a digital-services firm, I built public systems inside California government at Social Services, the Energy Commission, and the Public Utilities Commission. That experience still shapes the work: collect less data, make decisions inspectable, build for accessibility, and keep a person responsible for the result.

See how I keep this site's AI assistant grounded and testable.

What I'm looking for

I'm open to senior engineering leadership and principal-level technical work where public outcomes matter. The title can flex; the work cannot.

The role

  • VP, Head of Engineering, Director, or Senior/Principal Engineering Manager roles where I can lead people and stay close to the architecture.
  • A lateral move or smaller title is fine. I care more about the mission, the team, and whether I can own the work honestly.

Where I want to do it

  • Energy, climate, sustainability, and utilities.
  • Public health and standards-based health-data interoperability.
  • Civic technology, workforce systems, and economic mobility.
  • Social services, public education, and accessible government technology.

If you need an engineering leader who helps people grow and still writes code, I'd like to talk.

Talk with me

Writing

Notes from the work: engineering leadership, accessibility, public systems, and AI people can inspect.

View all writing

Open source

A few public repositories from my portfolio. Each says what works, what does not, and what still needs human review.

  • GTFS Scorecard

    Plain-language quality reports for more than 1,100 U.S. and Canadian GTFS feeds. It runs the MobilityData validator, shows the highest-impact fixes, monitors realtime data where available, and can stop a broken feed in CI.

    • Civic data
    • Public transit
    • GTFS

    Live site (opens in a new tab)Source (opens in a new tab)

  • TODS Validate

    A validator for the Transit Operational Data Standard (TODS): a CLI, a reusable GitHub Action, and a pre-commit hook that check a feed against the spec and explain each finding in plain language. Published to PyPI.

    • Transit data
    • Open standards
    • Python

    Source (opens in a new tab)

  • Nearmiss

    Road-hazard analysis that accounts for exposure and uncertainty instead of treating a heat map as evidence. It includes known-answer hotspot tests, multi-source ingestion, and a QGIS plugin. The public demos use synthetic data and say so.

    • Road safety
    • Spatial statistics
    • Open data

    Live site (opens in a new tab)Source (opens in a new tab)

  • Swelter

    A community heat and air-quality sensing network: a pipeline that ingests low-cost sensor readings, calibrates them against reference monitors, and maps urban heat islands and air quality. Open data by default, exported through the OGC SensorThings standard.

    • Climate
    • Open data
    • Python

    Live site (opens in a new tab)Source (opens in a new tab)

Browse every public repository (opens in a new tab)

Experience

  1. Apr 2025 – Present

    Remote

    Senior Director of Engineering

    at Coforma

    I lead engineering managers and individual contributors delivering public-interest digital services. I set direction for architecture, delivery, accessibility, security, reliability, and sustainable operations.

    I develop engineering practices for planning, hiring, onboarding, mentoring, career growth, and coordination across programs and disciplines.

    I partner with product, design, research, delivery, security, and government stakeholders to turn policy and program needs into maintainable services.

  2. Mar 2023 – Apr 2025

    Remote

    Director of Engineering

    at Coforma

    I progressed from principal engineer into engineering leadership while remaining hands-on. I established delivery practices, clearer ownership, and team-development systems across programs.

  3. Sep 2022 – Mar 2023

    Remote

    Principal Software Engineer

    at Coforma

    I served as a principal engineer on public-interest digital services, helping guide full-stack architecture, cloud operations, bilingual access, and standards-based data exchange.

Earlier roles (6)

  1. Jun 2022 – Sep 2022

    Career break

    at Bereavement

    I stepped away from full-time work to care for my mother in her final months and continue my professional education. She shaped my career and made this work possible.

    In memory of Joyce Kelly-Reif (opens in a new tab)

  2. Apr 2022 – May 2022

    Berkeley, California · Hybrid

    Application Development Lead

    at University of California, Berkeley, School of Education

    I led development of the 21CSLA HUB for California's statewide school-leadership academy. The platform gives district, school, and teacher leaders free access to equity-centered learning, coaching, and resources, including support for the state's Universal Prekindergarten rollout.

  3. Aug 2021 – Apr 2022

    Sacramento, California · Remote

    Lead Software Engineer

    at California Energy Commission

    I architected and shipped the Energy Commission's AWS Data Submission Portal for regulatory energy-data submissions and helped lead cloud modernization.

    I also helped maintain MAEDbS, California's public appliance-efficiency certification service.

    I built energy-data pipelines and policy dashboards and worked with petroleum operators, power-plant operators, and commission leaders to make the migration usable in practice.

  4. Feb 2021 – Aug 2021

    Sacramento, California · Remote

    Principal Software Architect

    at California Public Utilities Commission

    I directed work on the Transportation Carrier Portal, a public online licensing service for passenger carriers.

    I also architected eCAP for telecommunications-access claims and broadband-grant payment requests. The commission launched it after my tenure.

  5. Feb 2019 – Feb 2021

    Sacramento, California · On-site

    Lead Software Engineer

    at California Energy Commission

  6. Oct 2016 – Feb 2019

    Sacramento, California · On-site

    Software Engineer

    at California Department of Social Services

    I built out and operated California's public Home Care Aide Registry, including renewal and ongoing-service capabilities.

    I enhanced caregiver background-check workflows and licensing fee-payment services supporting state social-services programs.

    I also supported program systems and analytics across California Health and Human Services.

Get in touch

Have a role or a question about my work? Send a note.

All fields are required.