Our Director of Operations, John Valachovic, wears multiple hats at Kaaterskill. He manages the survey department under the direction of his wife Christine who is our Principal licensed land surveyor and he also handles supervising the firms day to day operations including safety and field work.
John grew up in Rotterdam, NY. He graduated from Schalmont Central School. He also graduated from SUNY Morrisville with an Associate’s Degree in Natural Resources/Ski Area Management, and later graduated from Schenectady Community College with an Associate’s Degree in Paralegal Studies. An avid outdoorsman since a very early age, surveying has ended up being a great choice for someone like John. He often says there are two types of people attracted to land surveying, those that excel at math and those that excel at science and he falls squarely in the second group, science, in particular the dirty boot sciences like geology, forestry, botany and ecology. John also has an aptitude for the law which is a very important part of land surveying, probably more than most people realize.
Along the Appalachian Trail
From surveying on the Appalachian Trail as rod man to working his way up to Director of Operations, he has a wide range of experience. He became involved in surveying at the age of 20 when he started working at a surveying firm in Troy, NY as a draftsman & field technician. John has worked at several Capital District surveying firms gaining much field and office knowledge during his tenure with each of them. During his career he has worked on almost every kind of survey job you could imagine from simple property surveys to shopping centers to hydrographic surveys to large scale property surveys for private companies and government agencies. He feels that one of the perks of surveying is there is something new every day to experience. Surveyors often see views and other sights that most people never get to see.
Near Windham, taken last fall.
When he’s not surveying, John is usually out with his three sons and their scout troop. As an assistant scout master for Troop 79 in the Berne-Knox-Westerlo school district, John spends many weekends camping, hiking, canoeing and enjoying the Adirondacks. Mentoring the next generation of leaders is a job he takes very seriously. An avid cook, including outdoor cooking, John is the cooking merit badge counselor and cooking advisor for the troop. He feels teaching young men how to cook for themselves and their families is a critical component in their development as men.
In his spare time, John collects antique bottles from old bottle dumps (another perk of being a surveyor), in particular soda and beer bottles. He also is an amateur railroad historian and has specific areas of research going on including logging railroading in the Adirondacks. An avid reader when he has time, John in particular enjoys Napoleonic era novels about the English Navy, he has been known to squander a bit of time reading the exploits of Captain Aubrey and Captain Ramage when he can get away with it. A model railroader for as long as he has been a surveyor, John is an active N-scale modeler and currently serves as the President of Albany NTRAK a modular model railroad group in the Capital District of New York.
All in all a busy person with a lot going on, John brings all of that energy to Kaaterskill to partner with our clients to build their dreams.
Kaaterskill Associates 