A Brief History
Sitka Trail Works, Inc. was incorporated in 1997, just after Alaska Pulp Company’s closure, to re-train and employ displaced mill workers. Six miles of community trail was built using Congressional funding dedicated to revitalizing Sitka’s economy. Trail Works was an important safety net for these displaced workers, employing them so they remained in the community and re-trained for more skilled, long-term employment. Founding board member Lisa Busch was recognized with a national award and highlighted in this video about the origins of Trail Works.
In 1999 the timber relief funds ended and the Sitka Trail Works Board of Directors reorganized under a new business model that emphasized a wider range of services to the community including planning and funding a new trail system, advocating for healthier lifestyles involving physical exercise and coordinating volunteer and paid laborers for trail maintenance and construction.
STW is achieving its mission through a combination of great leadership provided by the Board and Executive Director and through the strong community partnerships that forged during the creation of the 2003 Sitka Trail Plan. The plan also included the partner Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signed by Alaska State Parks, US Forest Service, National Park Service, Sitka Tribe, City and Borough of Sitka and Sitka Trail Works. The trail plan with the signed MOU was published by STW after 3 years of community dialogue and public input.
Sitka Trail Works Strategic Plan
Our Core Purpose: Trails!
Mission
Create, maintain, and promote a beautiful, diversified, and accessible trail system, as our gift to future generations. These trails will provide a wide range of opportunities for physical activity, economic development, cultural enrichment, and spiritual renewal.
Long term Goals
We are on Lingít Aaní.
Sitka Trail Works recognizes that we operate on Lingít Aaní, the ancestral and unceded territory of the Lingít people, who have stewarded this land for over 10,000 years. We acknowledge the deep historical and cultural connection the Lingít people have to the trails, waterways, and mountains we share. We extend our deep gratitude for and seek to uphold the enduring lessons of balance, respect, and care for the earth embedded in traditional Lingít values.
To be an active partner, Sitka Trail Works is dedicated to:
- Investing in the long-term health of public lands by centering Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) and supporting cultural revitalization.
- Acknowledging and celebrating the Lingít connection to the land through communications and programming.
- Working in partnership with the Sitka Tribe of Alaska (STA) toward shared goals.
Our commitment
Sitka Trail Works was established to uplift the health of our whole community. We advance projects, programming, and policies that connect all Sitkans with the physical, mental, cultural, and spiritual benefits of life outdoors. To ensure that we can serve our community as best as possible while benefiting the greatest number of Sitkans, we are committed to celebrating diversity, advancing equity, and fostering inclusion.
This commitment encompasses our board and staff team, workplace, volunteer program, youth program, hikes, and events. We strive to foster spaces where people of all identities and backgrounds feel welcome, respected, supported, and valued. We focus on reducing and eliminating barriers that have historically existed and continue to impede universal access to the outdoors. Embracing a greater array of life experiences, talents, perspectives, and individual differences in the people who work, volunteer, and engage with Sitka Trail Works is key to successfully delivering our mission.
thank you to our 2026 TOp business sponsors
thank you to our sustaining business sponsors
- Fisherman’s Quay, LLC
- Russian American Company