Staff Spotlight Meet Our New Conservation Director

Hello everyone! My name is Austin Easter and I’m excited to be Montezuma Land Conservancy’s (MLC) new Conservation Director.

I look forward to bringing my twelve years of stewardship, trail planning, and coalition building to the MLC community. I began my conservation career with backcountry stewardship crews while in high school, learning the landscape, developing a sense of place, and in the meantime getting my hands dirty in the work. During my time in Washington state, I spent over 500 days in the field helping youth and adult volunteers earn to appreciate their natural landscape and how sacred and important it is to protect these natural areas.

I am deeply passionate about creating stewardship and conservation programming that reduces barriers and creates opportunities for underrepresented communities within these fields to have their voices heard and valued. I am so excited to continue diving into this work with MLC and look forward to your support in conserving these spaces that can be preserved for future generations.

A bit about me, I love talking about crosscut saws, trail planning and development, and designing land management proposals that fit the needs of all user groups. When not out on the trail, you can find me playing cribbage or board games, pack rafting the San Juan, learning how to mountain bike, or spending quality time along the Dolores with my partner and dog.

I look forward to meeting you in person over the coming months and continuing to build upon this incredible community.