Davenport, Iowa, resident earns national Corps of Engineers award

ST. PAUL, Minn. – The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Headquarters in Washington, D.C., selected Mark Cornish of Davenport, Iowa, as the recipient of its 2023 Civil Works Planning Excellence Award for his work on the Lock and Dam 22 Fish Passage project.

Cornish works for the Corps’ St. Paul District as a senior biologist and technical specialist but sits in the Corps’ Rock Island District. His award involved his contribution and leadership to develop the first large-scale fish passage structure on the navigable portion of the Upper Mississippi River. Cornish and the project team developed and started executing a complex and critical monitoring and adaptive management plan at the site.

The Lock and Dam 22 Fish Passage project, located near Saverton, Missouri, will create a nature-like fishway that could pass more than 160 different species of fish. Because it is the first fishway on the Mississippi, scientific monitoring has been essential to better understand fish behavior in large rivers and capture lessons learned that will improve future projects.

“Mark’s technical leadership on teams leads to water resources decisions that are innovative, environmentally sound, and fully collaborated with other agencies and partners,” said Terry Birkenstock, chief of the

Corps of Engineers Regional Planning and Environment Division North, and Cornish’s supervisor. “He embodies what planning excellence looks like with his ability to bring partners and stakeholders together towards a common vision and drive projects forward with a trust and credibility earned by not only his technical excellence but also his past actions.”

Cornish earned a bachelor’s of science in fisheries and wildlife biology from Iowa State University and a master’s of science in biology from Western Illinois University. He began his career with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources working as an aquaculturist and field technician at the Fairport Fish Hatchery. He moved to the Corps of Engineers in 1998, where he has worked as a biologist ever since. He has worked on numerous water resources project teams and has authored environmental compliance documents, journal articles and policy in support of the navigation, ecosystem restoration and environmental stewardship programs on the Mississippi River and Illinois Waterway.

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