Commercial Shellfish Inspector and Enforcement Lead - Public Health Advisor 3

Environmental Public Health – Office of Environmental Health and Safety

Permanent · Full-time · Hybrid Remote/Field

The Opportunity

Join the Office of Environmental Health and Safety (OEHS) within the Division of Environmental Public Health (EPH) and help advance the Department of Health’s mission to protect and improve the health of Washington residents. In this role, you’ll support implementation of the Healthy Environments for All (HEAL) Act, strengthen Tribal partnerships, improve environmental justice outcomes, and ensure safe shellfish harvesting across Washington’s shorelines.

Key Responsibilities

• Conduct standardized public health inspections of licensed shellfish operations—non-tribal and tribal—to verify compliance with state, Tribal, and National Shellfish Sanitation Program (NSSP) requirements.
• Perform pre-operational, routine, certification, and follow-up inspections.
• Review HACCP plans, monitoring records, Harvest Site Certifications, sanitation procedures, and shellfish identification practices to ensure accuracy and compliance.
• Provide technical assistance to operators on regulatory requirements and corrective actions.
• Lead the enforcement program, ensuring all actions include proper citations from WAC, RCW, and NSSP.
• Serve as liaison with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife for joint enforcement activities.
• Follow the HEAL Act’s community engagement expectations and conduct environmental justice assessments.
• Coordinate, draft, and track enforcement documents and support consistency across inspectors.
• Process export certificate requests in alignment with regulatory standards.
• Monitor the Shellfish Inbox and support timely responses to inquiries.
• Provide customer service support via the program’s mainline phone.

Why You’ll Love This Role

You’ll help protect one of Washington’s most iconic natural resources—shellfish—while advancing equity, innovation, and engagement in environmental public health. Your work directly supports healthier environments, stronger Tribal partnerships, greater environmental justice, and safer seafood for communities across the state.

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS

We value all relevant experience (paid or unpaid) and encourage applicants from all backgrounds. Experience may have been gained through paid or unpaid activities. While “Preferred Experience” is not required, these skills or experiences can help you stand out as a candidate.

Please ensure any relevant experience defined below is outlined in your cover letter, resume, and/or applicant profile.

A bachelor’s degree in public health, environmental health, natural or physical science, or a closely allied field.

AND

Two (2) or more years of experience in a public health or environmental health position, including at least one (1) year of field experience with food service inspections.

About WA State DOH

Our programs and services help prevent illness and injury, promote healthy places to live and work, provide information to help people make good health decisions and ensure our state is prepared for emergencies. To accomplish all of these, we collaborate with many partners every day. We help ensure a safer and healthier Washington by: Working to improve health through disease and injury prevention, immunization, and newborn screening Providing health and safety information, education and training so people can make healthy choices Promoting a health and wellness system where we live, learn, work, play and worship Addressing environmental health hazards associated with drinking water, food, air quality and pesticide exposure Protecting you and your family by licensing healthcare professionals, investigating disease outbreaks and preparing for emergencies

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