For Hilary Sager, Destination Development Manager with Travel Oregon, leadership is about rising to the moment, no matter what your title may be. In this time of social justice reckoning, that means asking big questions about how recreation and tourism can be part of creating a more equitable world.

With the passage of the Great American Outdoors Act (GAOA), the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) now has a guaranteed source for $900 million in mandatory annual funding for outdoor recreation and conservation projects across the nation. That’s great news, but it also raises big questions about the best way to invest those much-needed funds. The Outdoor Recreation Roundtable (ORR).

Zavier Borja’s capstone project for OREI’s inaugural Leadership program didn’t just build on his already impressive leadership skills—it also helped school kids in Bend rebuild connections to the outdoors that had been lost in the COVID shutdown.