Natural Resource Specialist 3 - PAAD LTNP

State of Alaska; Anchorage (AK); On-site; USD 80,000 - 110,000; Full time

Job summary

State of Alaska is seeking a Natural Resource Specialist 3 in Anchorage to support PAAD public access priorities across rivers, lakes, trails, and state lands. The role includes research, data collection, geospatial analysis, and title and historical investigations, with fieldwork conducted in remote areas.

You will work within a small PAAD team on interagency reviews and inquiries, handle gear and logistics, and maintain inventories.

Qualifications

• Education in natural resource management or related field with progressively responsible experience.
• Competencies in analytical thinking, decision-making, and environmental science.
• Ability to conduct fieldwork and data collection across remote locations.

Responsibilities

• Conduct geospatial analyses, data collection, and title/historical research.
• Assess navigability of rivers and lakes, public access rights, and public inquiries.
• Coordinate interagency reviews and perform PAAD duties, including fieldwork logistics.
• Maintain inventories and assist teammates with field operations.

Skills

Project management

Research

Adaptability

Education

Bachelor's degree in natural resources or related field

Tools

ArcGIS

Job description

Natural Resource Specialist 3 - PAAD LTNP (PCN 10-N24024) | Workplace Alaska page has loaded.

The Department of Natural Resources, Division of Mining, Land & Water, is recruiting for a Natural Resource Specialist 3 in Anchorage.

This position is open to Alaska Residents only.

This NRS 3 LTNP position will work on numerous projects involving the navigability of rivers and lakes across the state; the legal validity and location of state-owned trails and rights-of-way across the state; and other public access issues. This position will perform needed research and analysis, including geospatial analysis; data collection; title and historical research; remote fieldwork; and other duties and responsibilities as assigned. This position will also, as assigned, have duties and responsibilities where interagency review and comments are needed from a public access standpoint; duties and responsibilities where public inquiries are concerned; and administrative duties and responsibilities, as assigned, within the PAAD Section ranging from gear purchase and maintenance to assisting other teammates with fieldwork and other logistics to maintaining inventories and accounting as required by other state administrative agencies.

Mission and Values/Culture:

The PAAD Section is a small, tightly knit group of resourceful, dedicated, and creative professionals who strive to ensure that Alaska's Constitutional promises of public access to natural resources, lands, and waters are kept for all Alaskans. Simply put, the vast treasures of Alaska are out of reach to most Alaskans in the absence of the public access that our trails, our rivers, our lakes, and our other waters provide. The work of the PAAD Section spans many diverse fields such as law, history, archeology, hydrology, geomorphology, and geology; it involves extensive involvement in litigation and administrative proceedings to enforce public access rights; it utilizes cutting-edge technologies, practices, and techniques in collecting and presenting data in support of its mission; and remote fieldwork to perform its important duties. The PAAD Section prides itself upon the qualitative and quantitative results it achieves; the creative and innovative manner in which it fulfills its mission; the professionalism, stewardship, and tenacity in performing its important work; and the dedication to each other that PAAD teammates demonstrate daily.

Benefits of Joining Our Team:

The successful candidate for this position will have the opportunity to work with a diverse group of experts and professionals from numerous fields (LAW, History and Archeology, Hydrology, Geomorphology, Surveying and Mapping, etc.); will have the opportunity to participate in high-profile and substantive projects advancing state strategic public-access priorities; will be involved on a daily basis in projects that will directly impact state ownership, management and control of state lands in perpetuity; will have opportunities to participate in remote fieldwork in gorgeous areas statewide; and will be part of an elite team within the Alaska Department of Natural Resources.

The Working Environment You Can Expect:

The PAAD Section is stationed together on the tenth floor of the Atwood Building in Anchorage. We routinely attend meetings, court proceedings, and administrative proceedings elsewhere. We also perform remote fieldwork across the state (recent projects include fieldwork within the Brooks Range, the Fortymile Region, Lake Clark National Park and Preserve, and numerous locations within the southcentral areas). The daily work environment will include interaction with PAAD teammates on numerous and diverse projects with frequent interaction with other state and federal staff, outside experts, attorneys, user groups, Native Corporations and the public.

We are looking for a candidate who possesses the following position-specific competencies.

• Project Management: Knowledge of the principles, methods, or tools for developing, scheduling, coordinating, and managing projects and resources, including monitoring and inspecting costs, work, and contractor performance.
• Research: Knowledge of the scientific principles, methods, and processes used to conduct a systematic and objective inquiry; including study design, collection, analysis, and interpretation of data; and the reporting of results.
• Adaptability: Adjusts planned work by gathering relevant information and applying critical thinking to address multiple demands and competing priorities in a changing environment.

Minimum Qualifications

This job class uses competency-based minimum qualifications. Please ensure your application (through work history, volunteer experience (duties summary), training, education, licenses, certifications, etc.) supports how you have gained the knowledge, skills, abilities, and behaviors (competencies) and that you possess the minimum required competencies for the job class.

Competency Description

The competency description(s) listed below have been designed to promote a common understanding of the essential elements of the job class. They highlight the more general and customary knowledge, skills, abilities (KSAs), tasks, and behaviors used to describe the competency. They typically list expectations rather than specific tasks and serve only as parameters and guidelines. A competency’s description is not intended to exclusively define every KSA, task, and behavior needed to meet the competency successfully, but rather to provide the manager/agency with a broad reference of options for how an applicant can meet the job expectation.

Minimum Qualifications

Any combination of education and/or experience that provides the applicant with competencies in:

• Analytical Thinking/Problem Solving: uses a logical, systematic, sequential approach to address problems or opportunities or manage a situation by drawing on one’s knowledge and experience base and calling on other references and resources as necessary.
• Decision-Making: Makes sound, well-informed, and objective decisions; perceives the impact and implications of decisions; commits to action, even in uncertain situations, to accomplish organizational goals; causes change.
• Environmental Science:Knowledge of the interdisciplinary concepts, principles, theories, and methods of investigating the natural and physical environment, including examination of ecology, biology, physics, chemistry, plant science, zoology, mineralogy, oceanography, limnology, soil science, geology and physical geography, atmospheric, and other related sciences in the protection and improvement of the environment and its resources.
• Legal, Government, and Jurisprudence: Knowledge of laws, legal codes, court procedures, precedents, legal practices and documents, Government regulations, Executive orders, agency rules, Government organization and functions, and the democratic political process.
• Writing: Recognizes or uses correct English grammar, punctuation, and spelling; communicates information (for example, facts, ideas, or messages) in a succinct and organized manner; produces written information, which may include technical material, that is appropriate for the intended audience.

Equivalent to those typically gained by:

Education in a natural resource field such as forestry, geology, agronomy, and hydrology, law, public administration, planning, economics, or a closely related field and/or progressively responsible professional experience in natural resource management.

Definitions

“Competencies” means a combination of interrelated knowledge, skills, abilities, and behaviors that enable a person to act effectively in a job or situation.

“Professional experience” means work that is creative, analytical, evaluative, and interpretive; requires a range and depth of specialized knowledge of the profession's principles, concepts, theories, and practices; and is performed with the power or right to decide or act according to one's own judgment.

“Progressively responsible” means indicating growth and/or advancement in complexity, difficulty, or level of responsibility.

“Qualified” means is assessed to credibly possess the competencies needed to learn the job in a reasonable period.

“Training” and “education” in this guidance are synonyms for the process of acquiring knowledge and skills through instruction. It includes instruction through formal and informal methods (such as classroom, on-line, self-study, and on-the-job), from accredited and unaccredited sources, and long duration (such as a post-secondary degree) and short-duration (such as a seminar) programs.

“Typically gained by” means the prevalent, usual method of gaining the competencies expected for entry into the job.

Special Note

For purposes of the minimum qualifications, natural resource management is defined as the management of the land, water, mineral, forest, oil, gas, agricultural, archaeological, natural and cultural history, park, and related surface and subsurface resources. Experience or education in natural resource management means involvement in the above resources exclusively. Those with experience or education in managing these resources may specialize in different management functions (for example, planning, regulation, research or title). All of this experience is applicable to the natural resource management definition. Some positions may require education in a particular area of natural resource management or specific technical knowledge and training gained through specialized education or progressively greater responsibilities at the lower levels of the series.

Additional Required Information

** Please read the information below carefully. **

If invited to interview, please bring the following materials. Failure to do so may result in loss of consideration. Required documents include:

• Professionally formatted resume or curriculum vitae.
• Academic transcripts, if relied on to meet minimum qualifications.
• A valid driver's license

SPECIAL NOTICES

• Fieldwork is required with this position. This fieldwork may involve interviewing witnesses, recovering data from archives, reviewing individual collections of documents, etc. This fieldwork may also involve self-sustaining multi-day camping trips in remote locations to collect data to support PAAD projects, with such fieldwork necessitating the use of ATVs, UTVs, small aircraft, inflatable rafts, canoes, and other types of boats, possibly engine-powered but more likely human-powered, and with such fieldwork subject to weather conditions and other hazards. Field skills are needed for the position; however, the successful candidate will receive additional field training as needed.
• This position will be privy to sensitive and confidential materials and will be required to follow confidentiality rules.
• This position will use ArcGIS related to PAAD projects, so prior experience will be very beneficial.

Supplemental Questions

For your application to be evaluated, you must answer the Supplemental Questions. The State of Alaska (SOA) uses four proficiency levels to measure and describe an applicant’s competence in applying specific behaviors, knowledge, skills, and abilities to accomplish a specific task. The four proficiency levels are Mastery, Fluency, Literacy, and Discovery. You must rate your proficiency level for each competency listed in the supplemental questions.

Education

If post-secondary education is required to meet the minimum qualifications, complete the Education section of the application. If you have not yet obtained a degree, please indicate the units you have completed. Copies of transcripts are required to verify educational credentials if used to meet the minimum qualifications for a position.

Special Instructions for Foreign Education

Education completed at foreign colleges or universities may be used to meet the minimum qualifications listed above. If using this education to meet minimum qualification requirements, you must demonstrate that the credentials have been submitted to a private organization specializing in interpreting foreign educational credentials and that such education has been deemed at least equivalent to that gained in standard U.S. education programs. Alternatively, an accredited U.S. post-secondary institution must report that the other institution's transcript is given full value or that full value is recognized in relevant subject areas aligned with the post-secondary institution's curricula. You must provide this evidence when applying.

Work Experience

If using work experience not already documented in your application, also provide the employer’s name, job title, employment dates, and whether full- or part-time. Applications will be reviewed to determine whether the responses are supported and whether the minimum qualifications are met. If they are not, the applicant may not advance to the recruitment interview and selection phase.

Note: Attaching a resume does not substitute for completing the application in full. Noting "see resume" or any similar response on any portion of your application may lead to a determination that your application is incomplete and removal from consideration for this job posting.

Bargaining Unit

If you are a current state employee, please indicate the union to which you belong at the time of application. Do not complete this question if you are not a current state employee.

Firearms

This position requires the use or possession of a firearm or ammunition. In accordance with the federal Omnibus Consolidated Appropriations Act of 1997 (PL 104-208), if you have been convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence, you may not hold this position.

A "misdemeanor crime of domestic violence" is an offense that is (1) a misdemeanor under Federal or state law and (2) has, as an element, the use or attempted use of physical force or the threatened use of a deadly weapon, committed by a current or former spouse, parent, or guardian of the victim, by a person with whom the victim shares a child in common, by a person who is cohabiting with or has cohabited with the victim as a spouse, parent, or guardian, or by a person similarly situated to a spouse, parent, or guardian of the victim.

Please ensure your application (through work history, training, education, licenses, certifications, etc.) supports/demonstrates that you possess the minimum required competencies for the job class.

EEO STATEMENT

The State of Alaska complies with Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Individuals with disabilities who require accommodation, auxiliary aids or services, or alternative communication formats should call 1-800-587-0430 or [phone] in Juneau or TTY: Alaska Relay 711 or 1-800-770-8973 or correspond with the Division of Personnel & Labor Relations at P.O. Box 110201, Juneau, AK 99811-0201. The State of Alaska is an equal opportunity employer.

Contact Information

If you choose to be contacted by email, please ensure that your email address is correct on your application and that your spam filter will permit emails from the governmentjobs.com domain.

Please direct questions about application submission or system errors to the Workplace Alaska hotline at 1-800-587-0430 (toll-free) or [phone] if you are in the Juneau area. You may also email requests for information to [e-mail].

For specific information about this position, please get in touch with the hiring manager at the following:

Phone: [phone]

Employer State of Alaska

Address PO Box 110201

Juneau, Alaska, 99811

Phone [phone] (Statewide toll-free number)

[phone] (Juneau and out-of-state callers)