MATCHING FUND

The LEGACY KEEPERS MATCHING FUND has been created for business partners, hiking and running clubs, and individual donors. These donors are committing to pool their gifts together as a matching challenge for our spring and end-of-year campaigns. Our goal is to motivate donors to act fast to double their impact for our cause.

TKO’s organizational growth is reliant on you, our Legacy Keepers.

In the donation form, please indicate your group affiliation by choosing the appropriate field from the drop-down menu, to ensure we can track the support you are helping raise.

The service we provide at TKO to protect and enhance the Oregon hiking experience through advocacy, stewardship, outreach, and education is only possible thanks to you and others in our community. Your gift to the Legacy Keepers Matching Fund will allow TKO to build upon the momentum from the last few years. In 2022 alone your past support allowed us to: 

  • Expanded important restoration in areas in the state impacted by wildfires

  • Host 450+ trail stewardship events for more than 2,300 volunteers 

  • Maintain more than 460,000 feet of trail and interacted with 1000s of visitors

You’ll see firsthand the direct impact you can have on Oregon’s trails in the coming year. Wherever in the state you love to hike, your support will help TKO do even more for your beloved trails in 2023 and beyond.

YOU’LL JOIN A DEDICATED GROUP OF TRAIL ADVOCATES WHO PROVIDE ESSENTIAL FUNDING FOR TKO’S WORK. JOIN US AT A BUILDERS-KEEPERS EVENT, A SITE TOUR TO WITNESS OUR STEWARDSHIP IN ACTION!

Builders-Keepers Events

We’ve all been through a lot over the last few years… Together, we’re navigating so much that we’ve never seen before. Our moments in nature are seemingly critical to reset, take the long view and hike on through these challenges. Oregon’s trails are more important than ever – to more people than ever. Increased use – plus the wildfire damage to many of our treasured areas – makes Trailkeepers of Oregon’s mission more important than ever. Big, audacious challenges lay ahead for Oregon’s trails and our programming:

  • Reimagining TKO’s OregonHikers.org and what +1.5 million page views can achieve in breaking down barriers to access to enjoy Oregon’s scenic sites near and far.

  • Providing safe & welcoming outdoor spaces through an expanding trailhead and on-trail Ambassador programming. Not all people feel safe & welcome in the outdoors due to racism, bias & hate – TKO aims to be a part of changing that.

  • Solving gaps in trail systems across the state, through a steady support of trail maintenance and advocating for inspiring efforts like the Oregon Coast Trail, Salmonberry Trail, Columbia Gorge Towns-to-Trails and so much more.

  • Activating communities to respond to wind & fire events that threaten our access to public lands due to limited local, state and federal resources. 

Read on for more details: TKO’s mission, vision & values, as well as how we are making change to our programming and Oregon’s trails to be more safe & welcoming!

TKO Strategic Plan 2020-2030
TKO's DEI Impact Goals

A nonprofit since 2007, TKO  started tracking our trail service in 2017. Here is what we have achieved in 5 years.

BY THE NUMBERS:

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Trail Parties

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Thousand Volunteer Participants

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Million Feet of Trail Scouted

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Million Feet of Trail Maintained

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Thousand Hours of Service

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Volunteer Leaders

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Ambassador Stations

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Thousand Visitor Interactions

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Parks & Ranger Districts Served

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Thousand Feet of Trail Developed

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Million Dollars of In-kind Service

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TKO Staff Positions Created

Here’s a sample of what happens when we are given the capacity to expand – Oregon Coast stewardship started in 2018, taking off in 2019!

SCALABLE GROWTH

TKO REGIONAL STEWARDSHIP HUBS

In just over 5 years, TKO now has in place 10 staff people – with regional hubs in Portland, Columbia Gorge, Mt. Hood, & the northern/southern Oregon Coast. The Santiam corridor east of Salem, Eugene to Roseburg in the southern Willamette Valley and the greater Prineville to Bend region are areas we see as strategic for TKO to grow our staff team’s presence. Each investment in TKO brings the possibility of staffing lifts to regions that need our support. TKO has a scalable growth plan to expand in urban regions down the Willamette Valley and connect to rural hubs to Oregon Coast and into eastern Oregon.

TKO Staff & Board

BUSINESS TIME

TKO’s First Staff Person, 2017

After 10 years a nonprofit, TKO stepped into hiring their first staff person in 2017. A capacity grant from REI Co-op made this possible, TKO implemented a donation program in July 2017. In 2 short months, a flood of support arrived with the overwhelming challenge of restoring Gorge trails from the Eagle Creek fire.

Learn More from ED Steve Kruger

Latest News

Fire and Rain – 2022 Tread School

A photo of people in hard hats using straps to carry a burned log through a burned forest. Over this image are the words Tread School - Fire Recovery Edition

Rebuilding trails from the ashes.

By Natalie Ferraro

With over an inch of rain pouring down from cloudy skies for the weekend, it was hard to believe that the forest that volunteers worked and trained in during Tread School 2022 had been the victim of dry weather, extreme winds and raging fires only two years earlier. A group of Trailkeeper volunteers were undaunted by the ‘atmospheric river’ and showed up at Camp Talaoli anyway. These hardy folks were here to learn the skills needed to repair hiking trails after wildfires, and to start  rebuilding trails damaged by the Beachie Creek Fire.

[…]

@ by Natalie Ferraro

Increasing Our Impact by Lending a Hand

Two people in hard hats work on their knees to install a piece of decking on a bardwalk.

TKO volunteers helped to build a new boardwalk at the South Slough Estuary Reserve this summer.

By Katie Vaughan, TKO Board Member

Throughout 2022, TKO crews set out on the Samuel H. Boardman Scenic Corridor—a 12-mile stretch of picturesque southern Oregon coastline—over 20 times, helping to recover areas lost to vegetation and time. Now, thanks to these efforts, you can have a picnic at Whaleshead Beach, hike from Natural Bridges to Spruce Island uninterrupted, or explore the Thunder Rock Cove Loop! […]

@ by Natalie Ferraro

Reopening Neahkahnie and more!

a group of volunteers in hard hats stand smiling on a dirt trail

TKO volunteers are all smiles at this trail party event on Cape Meares

by Loren Payne

Throughout 2022, TKO volunteer crews have been caring for the trail systems on Oregon’s beautiful North Coast. Trails were maintained, existing trails were extended, and closed trails were reopened to the public for the first time in years! […]

@ by Natalie Ferraro
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