JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – Ed Hassinger, the newly appointed director of the Missouri Department of Transportation, prioritized safety during his first annual report to Missouri lawmakers on Thursday.

A former district engineer for St. Louis and chief engineer for the state, Hassinger was appointed MoDOT director in November 2024.

The department is required, by law, to submit an annual report to the Joint Committee on Transportation Oversight.

“It’s an accountability measure for the department,” he told FOX 2 News. “I talked to them about what we have accomplished over the last year. Our priority is to deliver the program.”

That program includes maintenance of more than 33,000 miles of highway infrastructure, which MoDOT says is the seventh-largest highway system in the country. It also covers some 4,000 employees, many of them “boots on the ground” personnel—as Hassinger referred to them—like snowplow operators and construction crews.

In a one-on-one interview, Hassinger acknowledged a trend being seen across nearly every industry and sector: retaining critical staff while aggressively recruiting the next generation.

“It’s a tough job market,” he said. “The people we hire are in high demand.”

Hassinger credits recent state employee pay hikes as a tool to not only keep employees but also attract new ones.

“We are in a competitive environment,” he said.

Safety was also brought up several times during the hearing.

“We have to make sure [MoDOT workers] are safe and that the public who are driving on the roads are safe,” he said. “It’s a huge issue.”