David Poppema

David Poppema serves as a key procurement professional within the Stewardship Contracting Branch of the U.S. Forest Service, where he facilitates landscape-scale ecological restoration through strategic contracting. His role centers on managing acquisitions that integrate timber harvesting with watershed protection, wildfire risk reduction, and infrastructure maintenance to advance sustainable forest stewardship. He specializes in complex, performance-based contracts under the Stewardship Contracting authority, ensuring outcomes align with ecological goals while enabling efficient resource utilization. His acquisitions typically involve heavy civil engineering services that support long-term forest resilience and public land management objectives. Poppema maintains consistent working relationships with a core group of contractors including Brink Brothers Inc., Peak Engineering LLC, AZ Hammer Down, LLC, Gabino D. Grano, and Gladhart LLC. These firms are frequently engaged for their proven expertise in executing large-scale, ecologically informed construction and restoration projects across federal forest lands. His procurement approach emphasizes collaboration with vendors who demonstrate technical proficiency in habitat restoration, road rehabilitation, and fuel reduction operations, fostering long-term partnerships grounded in performance and compliance with environmental standards. Poppema’s contracting portfolio reflects a full commitment to small business participation, with 100% of his acquisitions set aside exclusively for small businesses under FAR 19.5. This consistent preference underscores a deliberate strategy to empower local and regional contractors with the capacity to deliver complex stewardship outcomes. His socioeconomic contracting patterns prioritize small businesses capable of mobilizing specialized labor and equipment for remote, ecologically sensitive sites, thereby strengthening rural economies and building local capacity for federal land management. His primary procurement focus is on NAICS 237990—Other Heavy and Civil Engineering Construction—encompassing projects such as erosion control, trail maintenance, stream crossing installations, and forest road upgrades. He specializes in procuring services that merge civil engineering with ecological restoration, requiring contractors to navigate complex environmental regulations, perform site-specific risk assessments, and implement adaptive management practices. His domain expertise lies in translating ecological objectives into enforceable contract deliverables that ensure both regulatory compliance and measurable habitat improvement.