Alex has been the Executive Director of the Yakima Basin Fish and Wildlife Recovery Board since 2006. He grew up poking around the woods and coast of New England and has an undergraduate degree in Biology from Williams College in Massachusetts.  He spent four years in Senegal, West Africa as a Peace Corp volunteer and trainer working on agroforestry projects in small villages in the Sahel, before meeting a fellow volunteer (now his wife) who somehow convinced him to move west and away from salt water.

During his five years in Tucson, he worked with and conducted research on collaborative groups addressing rangeland and forest management issues, and received a Master’s of Science in Renewable Natural Resource Studies from the University of Arizona.  He then spent five years running the North Fork John Day Watershed Council in eastern Oregon, where he worked with ranchers and other landowners to design, fund and implement fish habitat and watershed improvement projects.

Alex enjoys learning about complex landscapes and the human livelihoods they support, and strives to bring together technical experts, stakeholders and policy makers to forge sound approaches to managing and restoring the river systems of the Yakima Basin. In his time off, Alex can be found tending to a project house and a few bee hives, reading too many books, or wandering the Cascades and the Blues with his family.

Amber joined the Yakima Basin Fish and Wildlife Recovery Board in February of 2026. She comes to us from Pawsitive Alliance, a volunteer-driven organization that works with rescue groups, shelter organizations, individuals, tribes, businesses, and other partners throughout Washington State to help vulnerable cats and dogs and their caretakers thrive together. Before that, she served as Managing Director of Tieton Arts & Humanities, which celebrates the community of Tieton though artistic & cultural programming, from 2018-2025.

Prior to her work in Tieton, Amber spent much of her career in Environmental Philanthropy at the Bullitt Foundation and the Campion Foundation. While at these Seattle-based grantmaking foundations, Amber engaged with campaigns to leverage the nonprofit sector’s powerful voice for social change, formalizing the expectation that policy advocacy is an essential role for nonprofits and their board leaders.

Amber is a graduate of Cornish College of the Arts, in Performance Production with a focus in Costume Design. Before moving to nonprofit management, she worked with the Seattle Repertory Theatre, Seattle Opera, Idaho Shakespeare Festival, the Empty Space Theatre, and Theater Shmeater, among others. She also sang with and served on the board of the Medieval Women’s Choir for more than 12 years, appearing on both of the ensembles’ studio recordings.

An avid naturalist and Master Gardener, Amber returned home to Selah in 2017 with her husband Sam and 16-year-old son Rowan. In her spare time, Amber enjoys exploring the great outdoors, making things, participating in citizen science, and growing and cooking good food.