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Thursday, 3:30pm

Integrated watershed restoration is critical but also challenging, and involves a number of wicked problems - since we don't have perfect science on interactions, nor often good data on current conditions.  Ultimately, some value judgments come into play. The goal of and commitment to integrated watershed restoration creates tremendous opportunities to promote collaborative engagement in restoration and stewardship in the West.  It brings transparency to our knowledge and data gaps, and the values we each hold, and can generate broad support for more creative, holistic management strategies.

Speakers

• Chris Frissell, Director of Science and Conservation, Pacific Rivers Council
  Integrating fresh water needs in a forest stewardship program

• Nick Goulette, Research Associate and Local Stewardship Coordinator, Watershed Research and Training Center
  Integrated planning for Hayfork’s municipal watershed

• Mark Henjum, Forest Wildlife Biologist, Umatilla National Forest, US Forest Service, and Coordinator, Blue Mountains Elk Initiative
  Integrating wildlife in watershed restoration

Moderator

Nils Christoffersen, Executive Director, Wallowa Resources

Recommended Readings

Coming soon.

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Chris Frissell

Chris Frissell earned his BA in Zoology at The University of Montana, and MS and PhD Degrees in Fisheries Science at Oregon State University.  After 15 years of field research on the ecology and conservation biology of streams, rivers, and watersheds of the west, he joined the staff of the Pacific Rivers Council, where he now serves as Director of Science and Conservation, with an office in Polson, MT.   He hails from a forestry family, and the need to apprehend the connected fate of people, forests and freshwater life, including fishes and amphibians, remains at the heart of his work.

Nick Goulette

Nick's work at the Watershed Research & Training Center centers around community-based and regional research into forest work contracting and wood utilization, coordinating local collaboration with the US Forest Service associated with forest restoration and fuel reduction activities, developing assistance programs for local contractors, and advocacy for national forest, energy, and development policies that benefit rural communities. Previously, he spent one year working in New York's Adirondack Park, northern New Hampshire, and western Maine marking timber sales and conducting forest inventory for a small private forestry firm. He earned a B.S. in Forestry from the University of Vermont (2004) with a concentration in Community-based Forestry. While in Vermont, he also worked as a Research Assistant for the Gund Institute for Ecological Economics studying characteristics of forest management planning in the state relative to ecological economic and sustainable forestry principles.

Mark Henjum

Mark is the Forest Wildlife Biologist on the Umatilla National Forest located in northeastern Oregon.  He also serves as Coordinator of the Blue Mountains Elk Initiative, a federal, private, state and tribal partnership to manage elk across 19 million acres of the Blue Mountains in Oregon and Washington.

Mark spent 31 years as a wildlife biologist with Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife holding various positions at the District, Regional and Statewide levels.  For 23 years he was the Regional Nongame Wildlife Biologist in the Departments’ NE Region. He was the Statewide Wolf Coordinator and lead author during development and adoption of Oregon’s Wolf Conservation and Management Plan.  He is a past President of the Oregon Chapter of the Wildlife Society, and served as Chair of the Eastside Forests Scientific Society Panel.

He is currently collaborating with ODFW to conduct a Moose satellite telemetry study to monitor habitat use and movements of NE Oregon’s newest ungulate species.  He is also working closely with State biologists to monitor Oregon’s first confirmed wolf pack (our newest carnivore species) on the Umatilla Forest.

Nils Christoffersen

Nils D. Christoffersen is the Executive Director of Wallowa Resources, a community-based non-profit in Wallowa County, Oregon. Nils has worked at Wallowa Resources since 1999. Wallowa Resources provides leadership in promoting forest, watershed, and community stewardship.  Field programs balance restoration work with support to value-added manufacturing and marketing.  Education and research activities promote the idea, skills, and practice of stewardship.  

In 2000, Wallowa Resources coordinated a County initiated Watershed Collaboration process designed to bring diverse stakeholders together in a long-term restoration and stewardship program of public and private land.  Local Stewardship Principles were developed as a foundation for this collaboration, which is in its eighth year.

Nils currently serves on the Core Group of the Rural Voices for Conservation Coalition, the National Commission on Science for Sustainable Forestry, the Global Concepts Group of IUCN-The World Conservation Union’s Sustainable Use Specialist Group, and the Governor of Oregon’s Community Incentive Fund Advisory Board.  From 2003-2005, he chaired the Governor of Oregon’s Eastside Forest Advisory Panel.  In 2007, he co-led a four-month external evaluation of the Community Forestry Research Fellowship Program.  

Nils’ previous work experience includes over six years in Eastern and Southern Africa on forestry, wildlife and community development issues. He has a B.A. in Economics (Honors) from Williams College, and a M.Sc. in Forestry from Oxford University, UK.