Staff

Martina’s connection to the natural world began at a young age with family hikes, picnics, and tubing down the powdery slopes of Mt. Hood. These trips fostered her love and curiosity for the outdoor and later inspired her to pursue a career in conservation. As the Conservation Technician, Martina assists with monitoring and field work to support the District’s Healthy Streams, Forest Conservation, and Invasive Species Management services. Previously, Martina worked as a field technician in Portland and Eastern Oregon, and held internships with the Johnson Creek Watershed Council, West Multnomah SWCD, and Columbia Riverkeeper. Martina earned her bachelor’s in Biology from Warner Pacific University. During her free time she enjoys baking a variety of desserts, exploring the outdoors with her family, and searching for thrift store treasures.

Lynn Barlow brings over 24 years of experience in the conservation field to the District. Her career includes 19 years acquiring, managing, and restoring public natural areas with City of Portland, and most recently, nearly four years with the state Department of Environmental Quality where she managed a federal loan program that funds water quality improvement projects throughout Oregon. Lynn began her conservation career as a U.S. Peace Corps volunteer working with food crop farmers to conserve topsoil in a mountainous region of west Africa. She values public and private landowner engagement in sustainable stewardship of natural and working lands. Lynn is committed to the District’s work in culturally inclusive outreach to communities for the purpose of enhancing livability through healthy soil, clean water, and diverse habitats.

Lorrie joins WMSWCD bringing over 30 years of finance and accounting management experience working primarily in the non-profit sector.  Her background includes fiscal program planning, budgeting, accounting management, analysis and forecasting in addition to full-cycle accounting process analysis evaluation. In addition to a career in finance management, Lorrie enjoys sharing those skills in a variety of volunteer roles within a number of local non-profit organizations including earning a lifetime achievement award as a Clark County fair volunteer. Lorrie is a Pacific Northwest native and a fourth-generation farmer.  She was raised on a beef cattle ranch in Klickitat County, but in her adult life has turned her energy to dairy goats.  In her free time, Lorrie enjoys taking care of the farm, gardening (especially dahlias), learning, building projects, and spending time with her husband Shaun, their two daughters and their families.

Michelle oversees the Early Detection-Rapid Response (EDRR) program and leads restoration efforts at priority sites affected by EDRR species. Michelle also co-chairs the 4-County Cooperative Weed Management Area, leads the PNW Garlic Mustard Working Group and serves on the Oregon Invasive Species Council. Michelle enjoys both connecting people together working on similar invasive species management goals and getting her hands dirty in the name of protecting Oregon’s natural resources. There is nothing more satisfying to her than working with a property owner to find and remove a patch of high priority invasive weeds before they can proliferate into a natural area. Her background is in forest research, conservation planning, ecological restoration, and invasive species management.

Scott has been working for soil and water conservation districts since 2006 and at West Multnomah SWCD since 2008.  Scott provides technical expertise to farmers, livestock operators, and horse owners in the District. He also leads the District’s efforts to restore large scale floodplains and wetlands along the Columbia River and Multnomah Channel, specifically the restoration of Sturgeon Lake, which has been a signature project of the District for over 30 years. Prior to working at West Multnomah, Scott got his start at the Columbia SWCD where he was the technical lead and district manager. In his spare time, Scott enjoys kayaking, skiing and trying to keep up with his two daughters.

Eleanor connects the District with our local communities through our online presence, print and digital publications, media outreach, workshops, and webinars. Before joining West Multnomah in September 2023, Eleanor worked at the environmental and social justice nonprofit Green America, where she was the editor-in-chief of Green American magazine for five years in Washington, DC, where she also got her degree in journalism, from American University. When not at work, Eleanor enjoys exploring Portland by bike and taking advantage of Oregon’s long sweater weather seasons through copious knitting projects.

Kammy is inspired by the beauty of the natural world and how it sustains us. She came to appreciate our collective dependence on “nature” in the U.S. and in rural communities of the developing world, where folks literally live off the land and confront scarce resources daily. As a child, she enjoyed climbing her neighborhood’s trees and exploring its woods, meadows, and creek. She now enjoys camping, hiking, biking, paddling, gardening, and learning about other cultures and places. Kammy earned her M.S. in Natural Resources from the University of Michigan and has been a natural resource professional since 1997. Her background includes environmental planning, community development, and protection of coastal lands, fish and wildlife. She is Senior Conservationist at WMSWCD, where she’s worked since 2004.

Shahbaz is determined to explore our collective natural heritages and common roots, and advocate for restoration efforts at the intersection of people and nature through climate justice. His experience includes research in both the genomic ecology of global change in agriculture and mapping succession trends in old-growth forests. More recently, he has gained valuable experience through the Asian Pacific American Network of Oregon (APANO) Climate, Health and Housing Institute Fellowship and working hands-on as a Forestry/Restoration Technician at Mosaic Ecology. He graduated from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign with a BSc. in Integrative Biology and a focus in Plant Biology/Ecology. He is also a candidate to receive the Geographic Information Systems and Geospatial UAS Specialist certifications at Portland Community College.

Ariana brings a deep passion for wildlife conservation and a diverse background in research, restoration and mitigation to her role as Urban Conservationist. Her career includes work reintroducing Kiwi in New Zealand, tracking Swift Fox on the Great Plains, and trapping Northwestern Pond Turtles in the Willamette Valley. Before joining West Multnomah SWCD in August 2024, she was a Regional Habitat Biologist for the OR Department of Fish and Wildlife where she shared habitat expertise on Oregon Conservation Strategy species and other wildlife by conducting landowner outreach, collaborating with agencies, tribes, non-governmental organizations, and watershed councils, managed two habitat tax incentive programs, and reviewed land management activities for seven counties. She finds her greatest joy in encouraging and empowering people from all walks of life to connect with and care for the land, and she integrates environmental justice and indigenous knowledge into her conservation efforts. She takes pleasure in helping landowners develop conservation plans that restore habitat and enhance connectivityConnectivity the degree to which patches of landscape are connected, either helping or impeding animal movement and other ecological processes like the flow of water or dispersal of seeds, increasing the District’s climate resilience to stormwater and wildfires, planning new community gardens, and managing our small grant program. Outside of work, she loves spending time in nature with her family, whether it’s catching snakes with her three children, backpacking with her girlfriend in the alpine lakes, or foraging with friends.

Laura grew up exploring the natural world, from dandelion patches and ponds near home to the diverse wilderness areas where her family camped and backpacked. Laura earned a Bachelor’s degree in forest ecology and botany from the Evergreen State College, and a Master’s degree in invasive plant ecology from Portland State University. She provided botanical and ecological expertise to a number of public, private, and non-profit organizations before joining the District. She now helps woodland owners grow healthy resilient forests by developing forest stewardship plans, providing technical assistance, and managing forest health projects for their properties. She also provides expertise on monitoring and data collection, plants, and pollinators. Laura has been a member of the District’s Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Committee since 2018 and currently serves as co-chair. Laura still loves backpacking and hiking as well as gardening and then cooking with all the abundant produce she harvests.