February 25, 2009

Mike Hamman

Mike Hamman comes to the restoration program after working since 1994 developing water resources for the state of New Mexico, city of Santa Fe and the Jicarilla Apache Nation.

The work involved "balancing the water resources available to the community for use in the utility, impacts on the environment and the surrounding communities within the region," Hamman said.

Hamman also worked from the mid-1980s to mid- 1990s for the Bureau of Reclamation in Utah, southern New Mexico and Albuquerque -- first as a civil engineer and later as resource management division director with responsibilities including reservoir and river operations and endangered species recovery coordination.

He came on board at the Trinity River program on Dec. 12 to replace Doug Schleusner, who retired after seven years leading the program. Hamman is living in Salt Flat with his wife, Sally. The couple has four grown children.

He enters the picture with the program in full swing and the river headed for what looks so far to be a critically dry year.

Two construction projects are planned for 2009 in Lewiston to provide more fish habitat. The program also conducts studies to monitor anadromous fish from fry and smolt to adult fish returning from the ocean, and to see what areas of the river the fish benefit from, and where there are problems. Its scientists gather data for the Trinity River Management Council, which recommends annual flow schedules depending on the water year type and the results of studies on the river.

"To do that you have to have good quality data and well-analyzed data," Hamman said.

"It's a pretty complex program," he said, and the agency works with entities including the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and Hoopa and Yurok tribes.

The program has an annual budget of about $10.2 million.

The restoration program is focused on restoring naturally spawning anadromous fish, which are estimated to be at 20 percent of their historic levels.

Attention is centered mostly on the 40 miles of river just below the dam, because that area does not benefit from tributaries bringing in gravel and cobbles that fish use.

"The closer to the dam," Hamman said, "the more human intervention you need."