David Swank

Dave’s primary responsibilities include coordination, facilitation, and implementation of fish and wildlife resource management and restoration activities, focusing primarily on fish passage fish passage
Fish passage is the ability of fish or other aquatic species to move freely throughout their life to find food, reproduce, and complete their natural migration cycles. Millions of barriers to fish passage across the country are fragmenting habitat and leading to species declines. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's National Fish Passage Program is working to reconnect watersheds to benefit both wildlife and people.

Learn more about fish passage within the Federal Columbia River System Operations (CRSO), within the Columbia River Basin. Dave serves as the USFWS representative on several multi-agency regional management groups including FPAC, TMT, SCT, AFEP, SRWG, FFDRWG, and FPOM. On these groups, Dave serves as a technical expert and relays the USFWS’s position on the impact of various hydropower systems on threatened and endangered species. Dave is also involved in the Fish Passage Facilities Inspection program that assures that fish facilities at 13 mainstem hydroelectric projects are being operated according to established criteria documented in the Corps of Engineers’ (COE) Fish Passage Plan (FPP) for the Fish Operating Plans for the Public Utility District (PUD) projects in the Mid-Columbia.

Program: Passage and Habitat Assessment

Current Projects:

1. Comparative Survival Study 

2. Various Regional Management Forums 

3. Hatchery Evaluation Team activities 

4. Lower Snake River Compensation Plan activities 

At CRFWCO since: 2016