Our Team

ALCES Landscape & Land-Use Ltd. is a collaboration of environmental scientists, ecologists, planners and management consultants. We are a unique group of colleagues working together to provide leading edge land and resource management solutions to government, business and society.

Dr. Brad Stelfox

Dr. Brad Stelfox

Founder, Landscape Ecologist

Email:

bstelfox@alces.ca

Phone:

+1 (587) 352-5808

Dr. Brad Stelfox

Dr. Brad Stelfox established Forem Technologies and the ALCES Group in 1995 and is the architect and developer of the ALCES model. He is an adjunct professor at the Department of Biological Sciences, University of Alberta, and the Department of Environmental Design, University of Calgary. Brad's research and teachings focus on the interface between human land uses and regional landscapes. The major development stream of Forem has been ALCES (A Landscape Cumulative Effects Simulator), a program gaining rapid acceptance by governments, industry, the scientific community, and NGO's to explore issues between landscapes, land uses (agriculture, forestry, oil and gas, mining, human populations, tourism, and transportation sectors), and ecological and economic integrity. Dr. Stelfox has received the Alberta Emerald Foundation Award (2004) and the Alberta Science and Technology Award (2003) for his contributions with the ALCES model in advancing understanding of land use sustainability issues and in seeking solutions that balance economic, social, and ecological indicators.

Brad and his wife Sarah live in Calgary. When Brad is not working on the ALCES model or guest lecturing on land use issues, he is likely on horseback exploring the mountain trails of Alberta's east slopes.

Matt Carlson

Matt Carlson

Ecologist

Email:

mcarlson@alces.ca

Phone:

+1 (613) 842-8333

Matt Carlson

Matt is an ecologist interested in applying a systems dynamics approach to communicate land use concepts and develop pragmatic solutions to natural resource management challenges. Over the past ten years, Matt has developed and applied simulation tools to explore the future effects of land use in a variety of landscapes from the Mackenzie Watershed in northwestern Canada to the Mbaracayu Biosphere Reserve in Paraguay.  Recent projects have focused on applying ALCES to inform the development of land-use plans that appropriately balance ecological and socioeconomic objectives.  Matt is also an ecologist for the Canadian Boreal Initiative, and has a Masters of Science in Conservation Biology from the University of Alberta. Matt lives in Ottawa with his wife and two children.  When not at work Matt can be found running trails, or after his kids.

Justin Straker

Justin Straker

Forest Ecologist, Soil Scientist

Email:

jstraker@integralecologygroup.com

Justin Straker

Justin Straker is a soil scientist and forest ecologist, and a principal of the Integral Ecology Group in Victoria, British Columbia. Justin has over 15 years of experience in applied terrestrial ecology, focusing on three primary areas:

 

 1.       terrestrial reclamation of industrial disturbances, including design, implementation, assessment, review and regulatory inspection of reclamation and reclamation-research programs for the mining and forestry sectors;

2.       terrestrial environmental-effects research/biomonitoring programs, including  design and implementation of studies on the effects of industrial atmospheric emissions and fugitive dusts (acidifying emissions, nitrogen and metals) on terrestrial ecosystems; and
3.       assessment of the interactions of human land uses and other ecosystem components, including development of land management frameworks and State-of-Environment reporting. 

In his work, Mr. Straker has provided technical advice and research support to industry, government and stakeholder clients throughout western Canada, and in Quebec and Peru.

Dr. Shanti Berryman

Dr. Shanti Berryman

Vegetation Ecologist, Lichenologist

Email:

sberryman@integralecologygroup.com

Dr. Shanti Berryman

Shanti Berryman is a vegetation ecologist, and lichenologist with more than ten years of research and consulting experience related to terrestrial ecology, lichenology, biodiversity, air pollution and environmental sciences. More recently, she has been working with Aboriginal communities on environmental and land management issues in western Canada. Shanti has applied her knowledge to a diversity of projects focusing on terrestrial ecosystems, biodiversity and land‐use within the Alberta, and in Alaska, Oregon and Washington. Since 2002, Shanti has worked extensively on social‐environmental issues related to impacts of air quality and industrial development on ecosystem health in the area of oil sands development of northeastern Alberta.

Shanti is currently an adjunct professor at University of New Mexico. She provides technical advice and research support to industry, government and stakeholder clients in Alberta, British Columbia and Alaska. Shanti is currently an adjunct professor at University of New Mexico and she provides technical advice and research support to industry, government and stakeholder clients in Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Alaska and Hawaii.

Ann Garibaldi

Ann Garibaldi has more than fifteen years of experience related to ethnobotany, traditional ecological knowledge (TEK), traditional use studies and vegetation ecology. She has worked extensively with indigenous communities in Alberta, British Columbia and Alaska on social-ecological issues in changing environmental systems.

Ann’s work explores processes to support meaningful and respectful dialogue between indigenous communities, government, industry and the private sector, with an emphasis on the interface between traditional knowledge and western science. Ann has brought her expertise and training in botany (B.Sc. Ohio University) and Ethnobotany (M.Sc. University of Victoria) to bear on issues related to: TEK and Traditional Land Use in mine reclamation processes; forest harvest management practices that support traditional land use; biodiversity and wildlife habitat reclamation and land management decisions, and more. Her approach emphasizes community participation in defining the project intent and outcomes, and she is committed to inclusive relationships with communities with whom she works. Ann has developed and executed multiple training courses on TEK discourse and applications. She has authored the book Medicinal Flora of the Alaska Natives (Garibaldi 1999) and sits on the Ethnobotany Advisory Board with the University of Alaska.

Noah Purves-Smith

Noah Purves-Smith

IT & Programing Support

Email:

npurvessmith@alces.ca

Phone:

+1 (403) 607-2171

Noah Purves-Smith

In 1997 after completing a course in Computer Engineering at the University of Victoria, and studying art fundamentals at the University of Calgary Noah created Ursudio Multimedia. A talented designer and programmer; Noah uses his talents to create effective web applications, designs, multimedia content and print advertising. Applying well-honed communication and team-building skills that Noah acquired after many years as a skipper on the Canadian National Sailing Team. 
When not working on stunning multimedia designs, Noah can be found sailing or making music with family and friends. 
Jennifer Janzen

Jennifer Janzen

Alberta Tomorrow Project Coordinator

Email:

jjanzen@alces.ca

Phone:

+1 (403) 932-4853

Jennifer Janzen

Jennifer Janzen joined the ALCES group in 2008 as the project coordinator for Alberta Tomorrow, a web-based educational land-use simulator. She holds a Bachelor of Science in Land Use & Environmental Studies and Biology, and a Bachelor of Education from the University of Saskatchewan and has worked for various government and non-profit organizations as a plant ecologist and educator in Saskatchewan and Alberta. She taught high school Biology in Alberta for 10 years while at the same time working with the Elbow River Watershed Partnership and Parks Canada to develop lesson plans on various environmental issues.   She and her husband now live in Cochrane, raising two wonderful daughters and instilling in them an appreciation for our natural world.
John Nishi

John Nishi

Wildlife Biologist / Landscape Ecologist

Email:

jnishi@alces.ca

Phone:

+1 (403) 931-2538

John Nishi

John completed a B.Sc. in Agriculture (1990) and a M.Sc. in Zoology (1993) at the University of Alberta, and was subsequently hired by the Government of the Northwest Territories (GNWT) as the Kitikmeot Regional Biologist in the central arctic. After 5 years in the Kitikmeot, John took on the position of GNWT Bison Ecologist where he worked with northern communities and First Nations on issues concerning northern diseased bison management (i.e., wild herds infected with bovine tuberculosis, brucellosis, and anthrax). Through collaboration with University researchers and other government agencies, John and colleagues contributed to conservation of wood bison by developing and implementing strategies for disease management and genetic conservation. 
After 13 years as a northern wildlife biologist, John joined the ALCES Group in order to expand his career path to include today's important issues concerning landscape ecology. As human land-use and its footprint on the landscape is often the single most important factor that affects long-term sustainability and health of ecosystems, John feels that it is critically important for governments and the general public to understand cumulative effects in order to make balanced and responsible land-use decisions. As a member of the ALCES group, John's current focus is on the application of ALCES™ and its integration with other modeling tools to understand and address land use issues in northern Canada. He has been involved in several projects that are focused on woodland caribou in the boreal forests of northern Alberta and the southern Northwest Territories, as well as migratory barren-ground caribou in the Canadian arctic.
John lives in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains southwest of Calgary. John is also a keen student of fly fishing and has competed internationally as a member of Fly Fishing Team Canada over the past seven years.
Mika Sutherland

Mika Sutherland

GIS Analyst

Email:

msutherland@alces.ca

Phone:

+1 (403) 931-2538

Mika Sutherland

Mika was born and raised in the Northwest Territories and completed a biology degree at Queen's University. She worked in Yellowknife as a Wildlife Technician for the Government of the Northwest Territories, Department of Renewable Resources (now Environment and Natural Resources) for a dozen years. During this time, she also spent several years traveling, learning, and working abroad. Mika has recently completed an applied degree in geographic information systems (GIS) from the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology in Calgary, AB. 

As part of the ALCES Group, Mika has been involved in GIS data preparation and analysis in projects related to cumulative effects monitoring in northeast Alberta (In Situ Oils Sands Footprint Monitoring) and continues to do GIS work more specifically related to ALCES model initialization (Alberta Caribou Committee - Athabasca Landscape Team, North Saskatchewan River Watershed and Dehcho Cumulative Effects Modelling). More recently, she has also been working with ALCES Mapper (Lower Athabasca Regional Plan, NW Saskatchewan Regional Planning ) to generate maps from ALCES output. Mika has been involved in several projects working as an ALCES analyst including a Petro-Canada Cumulative Effects Assessment and Athabasca Landscape Team project. 

Mika lives and works SW of Calgary with her husband, John Nishi.
Timothy Barker

Timothy Barker

Forester, GIS Analyst, Programmer

Email:

tbarker@alces.ca

Phone:

+1 (780) 625-5848

Timothy Barker

Tim is a professional forester with 21 years of work experience in the Canadian forest industry.  Through his career he has steadily advanced in roles of increasing responsibility; both in technical areas and in management.  His particular focus is on applying spatial modeling to strategic forest management planning.  Through the clever application of GIS, statistics, and spatial modeling, Tim has provided consistent value to projects.  As an objective, visionary thinker, Tim always provides practical solutions that balance the long term needs of clients. 

When not working or spending quality time with his family in Peace River Alberta, Tim can be found hunting the vast northern forest or tackling some extreme DIY construction projects.

Shawn Francis

Shawn Francis

Landscape Ecologist / Landuse Planner

Email:

sfrancis@alces.ca

Phone:

+1 (403) 823-5048

Shawn Francis

Shawn Francis is a landscape ecologist and land use planner with sixteen years of professional experience. He has worked throughout western and northern Canada, leading or participating in a number of land use and resource planning, impact assessment, First Nations training, ecological land classification, cumulative effects assessment and land-use modeling projects. His focus with the ALCES Group is the application of land use models to support decision-making in land-use planning processes. Shawn completed his M.Sc. at the University of Alberta in 1996, investigating fire ecology and natural disturbance patterns in southwest Yukon. Following his graduate degree, he was the manager/senior ecologist for an environmental consulting firm in Whitehorse, Yukon that provided services to northern governments, industries and First Nations. Following this position, he was the Coordinator/Senior Land Use Planner for the North Yukon Planning Commission where he guided the development of the first approved regional plan in Yukon. Over the past five years he has supported a number of ALCES Group projects, including the Alberta Land Use Framework.

Shawn and his family currently live in Drumheller, Alberta, where he is an active member of the Drumheller Municipal Planning Commission.

Dr. Michael Sullivan

Dr. Michael Sullivan

Fisheries Ecologist

Dr. Michael Sullivan

Michael Sullivan's passion for wildlife has led him through three academic degrees at the University of Alberta and 25 years of fisheries, wildlife, and landuse management with the Alberta Fish and Wildlife Division. For much of this career, Dr. Sullivan's work has been focused on resolving fisheries and aquatic issues in the Lakeland and Athabasca areas of north-eastern Alberta. His successful work on restoring northern Alberta's walleye fisheries through the interaction of scientific models and public involvement has resulted in awards and recognition at local and international levels. Through close working relationships with other landscape management and research agencies (e.g., Parks Canada, Alberta Conservation Association, Alberta Cooperative Conservation Research Unit, Department of Fisheries and Oceans), Dr. Sullivan has built a network of strategic learning around the complex interplay between ecological and social systems. Michael is currently the Provincial Fisheries Scientist at Alberta Fish and Wildlife Division, Department of Sustainable Resource Development. He is also a Visiting Scientist at the Department of Renewable Resources (University of Alberta), where he is supervising graduate students, coordinating landscape-level research programs, and participating in ALCES projects with his colleagues at Forem Technologies.    


Dr. Scott Heckbert

Dr. Scott Heckbert

Environmental Economist

Email:

scott.heckbert@gmail.com

Phone:

+1 (503) 206-9220

Dr. Scott Heckbert

Dr. Scott Heckbert is an Associate at ALCES Group, providing environmental economics research and spatially-explicit simulation modelling of land use policies. Dr. Heckbert is also an assistant professor at Portland State University's Institute for Sustainable Solutions and previously worked for 7 years as an environmental economist and modeler with CSIRO, Australia. Scott's research applies environmental economics using simulation modelling of integrated social-ecological systems. Dr. Heckbert completed his MSc (Agriculture and Resource Economics) at the University of Alberta, and PhD (Engineering: Geomatics) at the University of Melbourne, Australia. Research topics include benefit-cost analysis including values for ecosystem services, economics of greenhouse gas mitigation, design of market-based policy instruments for environmental management, water quality improvement for marine ecosystems, modelling the rise and fall of ancient societies, modelling patterns of urban sprawl, rangelands management, and supporting Indigenous land management for environmental and cultural benefits. Scott develops simulations using systems dynamics, agent-based models, cellular automata and networks, in order to build spatially-explicit simulations which represent biophysical and human processes.    


Dr. Christopher Shank

Dr. Christopher Shank

Wildlife Biologist

Email:

ccshank@gmail.com

Phone:

+1 (403) 851-1440

Dr. Christopher Shank

Chris Shank is a wildlife biologist interested in mountain ungulates, biodiversity and protected areas planning. Chris has been on staff and the Universities of British Columbia and Calgary and for many years was a biologist with the Governments of the Northwest Territories and Alberta. He is a past Chair of the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada. More recently, Chris led an International Union for the Conservation of Nature biodiversity conservation project in the mountains of northern Pakistan and successful efforts by the Wildlife Conservation Society to set up Afghanistan’s first national park.

Sharna Nolan

Sharna is a experienced sociologist and project leader with 8 years of practical experience in designing, implementing and evalutating a wide range of community development and natural resource management projects in high risk, transitional and developed contexts. With specialist skills in cross cultural facilitation and mediation, Sharna has led collaborative planning effort  and policy development  for water allocation and climate change adapation action planning in Northern Australia (CSIRO, Australian Government), disaster risk management planning in Indonesia and Fiji (Monash University, UNEP, Medical Services Pacific), and rural livelihood, education and employment programs in Central Australia, Afghanistan and China (AusAID, UNDP and World Bank). Sharna has a number of peer reviewed publications that examine the complexities of adopting collaborative planning and resolving resource conflict in contentious and cross cultural contexts. She is currently employed as a technical advisor by World Vision where she is developing strategies to address indigenous disadvantage in Aboriginal communities in remote Australia, and offers research and policy support to education and nutrition projects operating in southern Afghanistan (AusAID, Save the Children). 

Dr. Bill Donahue

Aquatic Ecologist, Limnologist

Dr. Bill Donahue

 

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