About the District
Jeff Cole
Jeff Cole is Chief of Staff at the St. Johns River Water Management District, where he has worked since 1994.
Cole is responsible for leading the District’s external communications, including overseeing the Office of Communications and Intergovernmental Affairs and media outreach.
Prior to his appointment as Chief of Staff, Cole was director of the District’s Office of Communications and Intergovernmental Affairs. Cole’s first eight years with the District were spent as a regional communications coordinator with responsibility for a seven-county area in central Florida where he worked with print, radio and television media to increase awareness of the agency’s projects and water resource issues, wrote a variety of news articles and gave presentations to community groups.
Before joining the District, Cole worked as an aide to an elected official where he communicated with the media and the public, assisted with policy formation, coordinated with other government officials and managed the office.
After receiving a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Michigan State University in 1985, Cole worked as a newspaper reporter for the Chronicle-Tribune in Marion, Ind., and then Florida Today in Melbourne, Fla. Cole, who received a master’s degree in communications from the University of Central Florida in 2001, won awards for his newspaper work and is a published author.
