Former WDFW Salmon Staffer Sounds Off On His Firing From NMFS

One of the most recognizable faces from WDFW’s team at North of Falcon in recent years moved on after last year’s edition of the annual salmon season setting to the National Marine Fisheries Service, but is now out of a job there following cuts announced in Washington, DC in late February.

Mark Baltzell of Olympia described his work as a NMFS fisheries management specialist as a “dream job” following a 20-plus-year career at WDFW, and said his position focused on the Columbia River in support of US v. Oregon fisheries management and that he had been recently appointed to the Fraser River Panel that oversees Washington-British Columbia fisheries.

But on the eve of NOF 2025, Baltzell said he received a termination notice from Vice Admiral Nancy Hann, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Deputy Under Secretary for Operations, that claimed he was “not fit for continued employment because my knowledge skills and abilities did not fit the agency’s needs.”

NMFS is a bureau of NOAA, which itself is under the Department of Commerce.

Baltzell, who was speaking during a virtual press conference held this afternoon by Washington US Senator Patty Murray (D), said that while he believed his layoff was illegal, his aim today wasn’t to get his job back.

“I’m here because I care. I care about the people and communities that are impacted by reduced or closed fisheries that my work supported. I care about the devastating impacts a diminished NOAA may have on Washingtonians and Americans across our country. I care about the tens of millions of dollars in federal money that is funneled through NOAA for salmon recovery, habitat restoration, monitoring, hatchery improvements, and supporting tribal fisheries. All is in danger of going away,” he stated.

Senator Murray and her staff organized the call to highlight the wider impacts of previously announced mass layoffs at NOAA to weather forecasting and the closure of local offices, and to warn about more job cuts for what was already a short-staffed federal agency.

Other speakers included a research scientist and an investigative support tech, both based in Alaska, as well as a former NOAA administrator, all of whom also lost their jobs recently.

Murray said that the agency’s scientists have a “crucial role” in protecting fisheries and waters.

“The Puget Sound, the Columbia River, they all rely on NOAA. In Washington state, salmon are not just a pillar of our economy – and of the seafood industry that is so prominent in our state – it is also a way of life for our communities, for our tribes, and it’s part of our state identity, so NOAA’s work could not be more important when it comes to that,” Murray stated.

A federal judge today ruled that six federal agencies had to rehire probationary employees, but the Department of Commerce was not on the list.

According to Baltzell, the work of his Anadromous Harvest Management Branch of NMFS’s Sustainable Fisheries Division is “small but mighty,” producing “hundreds of millions in economic activity around salmon fisheries coast-wide.”

Even though he’s out of a federal job (he’s temping for WDFW in the meanwhile), Baltzell said he still cared about it because NMFS is “loaded” with people who feel similarly to him and who believe in the agency’s science and mission.

“I care because I am a dad, a grandpa and a fisherman, and I want to ensure these resources are perpetuated for the generations following me. Gutting NOAA and the federal government puts all those things that I care about at risk,” he said.

During a briefing last week of the Pacific Fisheries Management Council, Jennifer Quan, NMFS West Coast Administrator (and Baltzell’s fellow WDFW alum), acknowledged her agency was in “choppy waters” and said that she’d instructed supervisors to “to essentially put their keel in those waters as we navigate them and help build stability.”

How the mass federal layoffs may affect the approval of fisheries over Endangered Species Act-listed salmon stocks and beyond or impact access to national forests and other public lands for hunting remains to be seen, but Andrew McKean at Outdoor Life took a deep dive into the situation yesterday.

McKean found both reason for hope …

“(Says) a source who lobbies on behalf of conservation organizations, if advocates can make a compelling case that their project or agency aligns with administration priorities, it will survive staff and funding cuts relatively unscathed.”

… and concern …

“State agencies that depend on funding from the wildlife and fisheries restoration accounts, called Pittman-Robertson and Dingell-Johnson, respectively, are reporting stoppages or slow-downs in payment, say directors of two wildlife agencies who asked not to be named. Both PR and DJ funds are collected and distributed to state and tribal fish-and-wildlife programs by the USFWS. These funds are critical for supporting state habitat work, public-land acquisitions, stocking programs, hunter education, new shooting ranges, and much more.” 

While briefing the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission on Friday morning, ODFW Chief Operating Officer Ken Lofflink said the agency had seen federal awards and contracts frozen and then unfrozen, awards removed from the federal payment system and then put back in, and messages from federal partners that funds would be frozen but that never actually happening.

But Lofflink said that as of this week, “all of ODFW’s federal awards are active and available for drawdown, and everything is operating as business as usual, if you will.”

Stay tuned