Howdy!
I am super excited to have recently joined the Colorado Water Trust Team in the Water Transactions Coordinator Role.
In my experience with friends and colleagues, when folks work in natural resources they often have a certain idealization of the future job they expect to do while still in school. In many cases, and it’s definitely not a bad thing, it just doesn’t quite shake out that way.
Initially, this scenario was true for me. In a stroke of fortuitous timing and luck, a little while after school, I ended up working for the Southern Ute Indian Tribe’s Water Resources Division.
I never anticipated working with tribal water rights and tribal water issues on a daily basis in school but it was an absolute privilege to cut my teeth in the Colorado water world working for four and a half years for the Tribe. That experience provided me with a unique and valuable perspective to water law, policy and institutions in Colorado and the Upper Basin.
Now, what excites me about beginning with Colorado Water Trust is that my position is exactly what I idealized in school. The Water Trust has an array of incredibly versatile tools in its toolbox for restoring flows to rivers in need and operates in such an important and exciting space in the Colorado water world. My education is in natural resource economics and management with a focus on water. I relish the idea of working on collaborative, market-based solutions to complex environmental concerns.
I can specifically point to a moment in time when an alumni of my college, who worked for Ducks Unlimited in an equivalent role, came to speak to a class of mine and I thought to myself, “that’s what I want to do.”
And now I get to.
I am based in and previously worked almost exclusively in the San Juan River Basin but am looking forward to looking at Colorado water through a statewide lens and working in some of the other beautiful river basins in the state.
Cheers,
Blake