 Portland Trails is a non-profit land trust that preserves green space for public access. Their goal is to connect people and places in greater Portland with a 50 mile network of trails. They recently held their annual meeting and Roger Burley was there. Hi, I'm Roger Burley. I'm a board member of Portland Trails and a proud one and I have been for about 11 years and I am at the 2012 Portland Trails annual meeting in which we're holding at the Rhine's room, conference room, auditorium, excuse me, at the Portland Public Library. And Portland Trails and the Portland Public Library are both members of Portland's community television station CTM5. And I have with me Jamie Parker who is Portland Trails, Trails Manager. So Jamie, what's the highlight going to be of the meeting tonight and what is really significant about Portland Trails in 2012? Thanks Roger. Well, tonight we're going to hear about the great work that we've been doing over the last year, 2011 into 2012 and some of the projects that we hope to accomplish in the coming year. We hope to build some bridges. Is that correct? Absolutely. Can you tell us where some of that work is going to happen? Indeed. We'll be building and actually we've already gotten underway. Building bridges on the Stroudwater River, the Przomskot River, our, I guess our largest bridge project we hope to accomplish is there is the connection to Brickyard Point, something that we've been seeking to build for a number of years. This is a bridge over the Skittery Gusset Creek in Falmouth that would connect to a landlocked parcel from the Tidewater Development. This is something that we'll be able to be seen from 295 heading north towards Brunswick out of Portland. And now I'm with the current board president of Portland Trails, John Osborne. So what's your expectation of the highlight of tonight's 2012 annual meeting? Well, tonight will be a different, I'll have a different set of welcoming remarks than I expected to have. I planned on my tenure as board president to be sort of a gentle hand on the tiller of the large tanker, not really changing direction. And it turns out that 2012 is going to be a transformative year. We've already seen a lot of that. And so I'll be sort of recapping all the change we've had in the organization. Well, it's probably pretty obvious, but to me, but what is the major change that you're talking about, or one of them? Right. Well, the highlight, of course, is our new executive director, Cara Wildrick, who's been great so far and she'll be great in the future, I expect. And so that's obviously the primary new change. And the nice thing is that amidst all of the changes in the organization, we're still, we still got our footprint getting larger and we're still getting work done on the ground. We're still finding more trails, we're still building bridges. And so it's really been a very productive 2012. So not really a holding pattern that's just moving forward. Exactly. Always. Exactly. All right. Thank you, John. I am still at the Portland Trails 2000 Revenue Meeting and I am with Cara Wildrick, who is Portland Trails' brand new, well, not quite brand new, executive director. So how has it felt for the last eight or 10 weeks working here, Karen? Oh, it's been fantastic. Portland Trails is a dream job and a wonderful organization and I'm thrilled to be part of a group that's made such a big difference in the lives of so many people that live in Portland. What has impressed you most in your first couple of months? I think the community's engagement around the work of Portland Trails. So getting active outside, connecting with the natural world, connecting with their neighbors. People are just thrilled to engage in that type of activity and we helped to facilitate that happen so they're thrilled to be working with us. And tonight's your first annual meeting. So what are you looking forward to especially tonight? Well, I've enjoyed in the first little while meeting some new folks, meeting some members, long-time members. I just got to meet somebody who's been a member for 20 of the 21 years that Portland Trails has been in existence and those interactions are really a treasure. Well, you've come from a job in Maine Audubon, which is really a partner in ways and so you probably know a lot of the people that are here from both worlds. Absolutely, yeah. A lot of people that care about wildlife and habitat certainly are interested in trails and urban green spaces. Well, we wish you well in this job for many, many years to come and we hope that Portland Trails will resume their presence on Channel 5. Absolutely. Thank you, Kara. Thanks, Roger.