Gulsum Rustemoglu

Bio

Gulsum Rustemoglu, originally from Istanbul, Turkey, moved to San Diego in 1998 to pursue her higher education goals. She has always thrived on learning, mastering, and helping others understand complex planning concepts. Gulsum received her Masters in City Planning and Masters of Arts in English and Comparative Literature from San Diego State University in 2001, and 2003. She was honored as a Young Planner by the International Society of City and Regional Planners and the Dutch Ministry of Transportation (2004) during the early years of her City Planning career. After working in various engineering and planning firms, she decided to implement her global vision in environmental field, and started GEPermit, an environmental consulting and permitting firm in 2009. She also successfully completed the Goldman Sachs 10K Small Business Program in 2014 and University of California, Los Angeles’ (UCLA) Anderson School of Management program: Management Development for Entrepreneurs (MDE) in 2016. She received the prestigious Woman-Owned Small Business of the Year 2016 award given by the San Diego District of SBA, in 2016. Her vision is to grow her environmental consulting and permitting business by being a mentor for young aspiring planners, professionals. She has developed niche in Federally funded Housing Urban Development projects as well as renewable energy projects, CEQA and NEPA consultancy.

In addition to being passionate about her work, Gulsum has additional interests both inside and outside of the workplace. She is a proud mother of two and an avid marathon runner. While running her own business, she decided to challenge herself and run 6 World Major Marathons at the same time, and completed them all in 2017.