Our Team

Mark Salvo spent six years as Conservation Director for Oregon Natural Desert Association, guiding the organization and empowering our members to advance campaigns to protect, defend and restore wildlands, wildlife and other public values throughout Oregon’s high desert. Now as Senior Conservation Advisor he continues to support the organization to pursue its goals while also addressing mounting challenges to public lands management and conservation in southeastern Oregon.

Born, raised, and educated in Oregon, Mark launched his conservation career in Oregon’s dry side, and his circuitous route back to the high desert has included stops in Phoenix and then Washington, DC, before returning home to join ONDA.

Prior to coming to ONDA in 2020, Mark served as Vice President of Landscape Conservation at Defenders of Wildlife. Working inside the “Beltway,” he was responsible for multiple programs and initiatives to protect species and habitat, while also defending against administrative and legislative policies and programs that threaten these resources.

Early in his career, Salvo helped to enact the Steens Mountain Cooperative Management and Protection Act. He petitioned to list three species and populations of sage-grouse under the Endangered Species Act, drafted various pieces of legislation, and managed a seminal threatened and endangered species settlement agreement with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Mark earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Oregon Clark Honors College and a law degree from the University of Oregon School of Law.