I am moving to Phoenix in august and I too am interested in full time work, preferably as a crew chief or field director (newly minted MA and 8 years of experience as a tech in the SE)...does anyone have a list of CRM firms in the Phoenix area (or AZ in general)?

This hasn't been updated in a few months, but you can check http://www.archaeologyfieldwork.com/AFW/CRMfirms.htm

I also recommend checking with the SHPO of the state you are interested to work in. Many list their approved contractors on their website or can otherwise provide the list on request. http://azstateparks.com/SHPO/index.html

Good luck,

Jennifer

There are numerous companies within Arizona, most of which are based  out of Flagstaff, Phoenix metro, or Tucson.  I would recommend checking with Northland Research (Flagstaff, Tempe), Ecoplan (Mesa), Archaeological Consulting Services (Tempe), Desert Archaeology (Tucson), William Self Associates (Tucson), and Paleowest (Phoenix). There are probably two dozen more companies out there- but these are the companies I've come to recognize as generally having fairly consistent work.
I am sure everyone is aware of this, but I'll reinterate- Arizona's economy was hit very hard in 2008 and much of the work we all relied on completely disappeared. Now, two years later, work is slow in coming and there are MANY out of work archaeologists already here in Arizona.  Some of the companies on the above mentioned list have gone out of business, merged with other businesses, or are downsizing.  Companies are being flooded with applications, and I have even heard of Phd's applying to field tech positions.
I know Ecoplan has a large project they have or will be hiring for soon.  However, most other companies are functioning solely with their permanent employees and not hiring.
I recommend keeping and ear and eye out for pipeline jobs, contracted BLM jobs, goverment jobs, etc. throughout the entire western US.  There seems to be alot coming up with pipelines, Uranium mining surveys, fuels reduction surveys, etc.
Good luck- things are getting better but are still a bit bleak.

    Things have been getting harder and harder here, I read an article a while back about how its going to take at least two more years for Arizona's economy to recover. I just wish that ADOT would get going on more projects, I know that they got a large sum of money from the stimulus package.
    I also heard about ecoplan's upcoming project, I am sure that they are going to get hundreds or CV's because of how little work there is right now, I also heard that Desert Archaeology and Tierra Right of Way have upcoming projects as well, but I'm not sure of the details.

How about the western US in general? I am willing to travel, but driving clear across the country for two weeks of work is a little out of the question. Most of the jobs I see consist of one or two openings, with a hundred CVs for each one.

Nelle is exactly right. Most companies in Arizona are going forward with their staff archaeologists and/or a set list of field techs that they have a long history with. A lot of companies are just getting over the process of thinning out their permanent staff (a few more may begin this process soon). I don't see this changing in the near future. Tierra and Desert are both using their own people at the moment. Your best bet is with EcoPlan. I think they want people with floodplain experience though. Northland may also be looking for people this summer, although I think they have a good idea of who they want to use (IF their project moves forward). These projects seem to be a temporary respite from an otherwise stagnant market. It looks like a lot of the Arizona companies are trying to sniff out work in other states.

Update on the Ecoplan project this summer: I've heard through the grapevine that, although they have an enormous amount of work to do in a VERY short period of time (has to be done by August), they haven't hired very many people to do it.  Perhaps that will change if the enormity of the amount of work they have to do becomes overwhelming.  FYI, I think they are starting next week.
So if you've applied to that job but didn't get hired- maybe it wouldn't be such a bad idea to just keep checking back in case they have to bring on extra people sometime between now and August to get keep that project on track for their August deadline.

If you have applied to Ecoplan I wouldn't keep your hopes too high, its my guess that since the word is out about their upcoming project they have probably received several hundred CVs. Good luck to all in the job hunt.