Armstead returns as Avondale Estates Public Works Director

Avondale Estates Public Works Director Bryan Armstead. Courtesy of Avondale Estates

Avondale Estates Public Works Director Bryan Armstead. Courtesy of Avondale Estates

After a nearly four-year hiatus, Bryan Armstead was recently re-hired as Avondale Estates’ Public Works Director. Armstead actually returned to the city last August as public works supervisor, then becoming interim director when Oscar Griffin resigned on Jan. 19.

“I was [Public Works Director] for seven years, up until 2014,” Armstead said. “I left to work on a businesses my wife and I had. Once that was on track I was ready to come back. I’m back where I belong.”

He’ll oversee a department of 16 (eventually 17) employees covering operations, parks and sanitation, code enforcement and landscaping.

Armstead worked 10 years as a law enforcement officer before originally coming to Avondale as a policeman in 1998, joining Public Works two years later.

Born and raised in the Decatur/Kirkwood area, he attended two colleges without graduating, but plans on changing that real soon. Now 56, Armstead is close to earning his undergraduate degree in business management and figures to start on his masters shortly thereafter.

“My son [Bryan Jr., a senior at Morehouse College] graduates this year,” Armstead said. “He’ll get his masters before me, but I’ll be right behind him.”