Scott Borg
TKO BOARD MEMBER
TKO board member Scott Borg first found out about TKO by pure chance.
“I was doing scouting work for the North Coast Land Conservancy, and I came across a Trailkeepers trail maintenance party,” Scott said. “And, you know, they were all wearing the hard hats, and carrying tools around and that sort of thing.”
The trail party was just about to stop for a lunch break, so Scott decided to join them and learn more about TKO. “I said, ‘Okay, so, like, what are you guys doing?’ and I was really interested in finding out what the trail conditions were, that sort of thing. Anyway, I had a really good conversation, and that was sort of my introduction to what Trailkeepers does.”
Scott ended up connecting with the crew leader, later sharing information he’d gathered in his scouting work. And, from there, Scott decided to volunteer with TKO. “Part of my motivation was to help convince them that a little bit of work was needed on the Oregon Coast,” Scott said. He participated in some trail parties, which convinced him to get even further involved by helping coordinate trail parties along the North Coast and the Oregon Coast Trail. “So a year or two later, when I started getting lobbied to throw my hat in the ring as a potential board member,” Scott said, “it was a little bit of an easy sell there.”
After growing up as a self-described “army brat” and spending much of his youth hiking and backpacking all over the world, Scott moved to the Oregon Coast for his retirement, largely because he loved the landscape. As a geologist who worked at the National Science Foundation for over thirty years, Scott has a wealth of knowledge to share with TKO, and he also understands how important TKO’s work is for supporting trails. “I kind of knew that there must be organizations like Trailkeepers from way back, because I had dealt enough with the U.S. Geological Survey to know that things like the Forest Service are chronically underfunded, and so are state park things, and so, without volunteer help, a lot of the trails can’t be maintained.”
When asked what being a Trailkeeper means to him, Scott described it as a way of giving back. “Recreational trails represent an opportunity to learn something new, to see other perspectives, to meet people,” Scott said. “You know, and so maintaining the trails and ensuring there’s a reasonably maintained network of trails is, I think, a great service to society.”
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