Assessing the state of your contracting opportunities, contractors, and workers is a key first step in any effort to build quality jobs in ecosystem management.
The resources below offer some tools for undertaking a workforce assessment, and using that assessment to create an action plan. One quick guide offers simple instructions for undertaking an assessment. The second offers suggestions for creating an action plan. In addition, we offer several links to actual workforces assessments and sample surveys that can be adapted to local circumstances.
Quick Guide to Conducting an Ecosystem Workforce Assessment (pdf, 92 kb)
An ecosystem workforce assessment collects information about the state of the industry in a particular locale. It generally includes information about the type and amount of work undertaken in a particular area, the businesses contracted to perform that work, and workers hired to do the work.
Quick Guide for Planning a Quality Jobs Program (pdf, 136 kb)
This document aims to help collaborative groups and their agency partners develop and implement strategies to improve the quality and quantity of the local economic opportunities that are being created through private and public land restoration. This guide is a companion to A Quick Guide to Conducting an Ecosystem Workforce Assessment.
Examples of Workforce Assessments
- A Report on an Assessment of Contractors and Forest Workers Involved in Stewardship, Restoration, Inventory, Fuels Treatment, Trails, Roads and Other Aspects of Forest Management in Trinity County, California (2005) (pdf, 177 kb)
- An Analysis of Local Contractor Interest and Capability in Stewardship Contracting in Lemhi County, Idaho (2006) (pdf, 84 kb)
- An Assessment of Federal Contracting and Contractor Capacity in Josephine County, Oregon (2007) (pdf, 760 kb)
- Forest and Watershed Restoration and Maintenance Opportunities and Capacity in the Siuslaw Basin, Oregon (2006) (pdf, 2.1 mb)
- An Analysis of Forest Service and BLM Contracting in Lake County, Oregon (2001) (pdf, 388 kb)
- Grande Ronde Model Watershed Program Economic Assessment (2001) (pdf, 36 kb)
- A Community-Based Assessment of the Developing Ecosystem Management Industry in Coos and Curry Counties, Oregon (1999) (pdf, 76 kb)
- Swan Valley Workforce Assessment (Montana, 2011) (pdf, 1mb)
Examples of Quality Job Action Plans
- Siuslaw Basin Restoration Jobs, Action Plan (pdf, 332 kb)
Sample Contractor Surveys
- Lemhi County Local Contractor Interest and Capability in Stewardship Contracting Survey (doc, 168 kb)
- Josephine County Workforce Assessment Interview Script (pdf, 196 kb)
- Siuslaw Basin Contractor Survey Script (doc, 56 kb)
- Trinity County Contracting Capacity Survey (doc, 524 kb)
- Gifford Pinchot Collaborative Working Group, Draft Contractor Survey (doc, 84 kb)
- Lake Country Workforce Survey (July 2001) (pdf, 36 kb)
- Wallowa Resources Survey Questions (pdf, 30 kb)
- Grant, Union, Wallowa County Contractor Survey (2002) (pdf, 100 kb)
