Doug Baston is a ninth-generation Mainer who lives in Gardiner. He has woods in Gardiner and Vienna. He graduated from the University of Maine and the University of Maine School of Law. He has worked as a consultant in the energy efficiency industry and as a public defender. He is a past president of the Maine Woodland Owners board of directors.

Kyle is a licensed forester and the Vice President of Baskahegan Company. He is responsible for management policy, forest certification, land acquisitions, carbon offsets, wood sales, and general company administration. He grew up in Southeastern Connecticut and earned a forest management degree from the University of Maine in 2007 which was followeed by time as a forest manager in the Adirondacks. In 2009, Kyle came back to Maine to work for Orion Timberlands serving as, among other things, the forester for Downeast Land Trust. In 2014, Kyle became the Land Trust Forester for Downeast Land Trust. He started with Baskahegan in 2016.

Hannah Carter is a native of Caribou, Maine and is dean of University of Maine Cooperative Extension. Carter received her Ph.D and master’s degree in agricultural education and communication, specializing in agricultural leadership and Extension education, from the University of Florida. She is a graduate of the University of Maine at Presque Isle.

Jim Clair is CEO of CSSHealth, a healthcare technology company based in Tampa, FL and Buffalo, NY and also owns or co-owns a number of companies in Maine under the umbrella, Clair Group of Companies. From 1984 to 2001, he served on the nonpartisan staff of the Maine Legislature. Jim holds master’s degrees from Syracuse University and the State University of New York, and a bachelor’s degree from the University of Massachusetts. Clair and his wife Jennifer split their time between China, Maine, where they own 155 acres of woods, and a home in Portland, Maine.

Mark Doty earned his BS degree in Forest Engineering from the University of Maine. His career started as a forester with Scott Paper and he retired in 2018 from Weyerhaeuser as Public Affairs Manager. He now works as a forester. He served as President of the Maine Forest Products Council, as well as Vice President of the New Hampshire Timber Owners Association and Vermont Woodlands Association. He has also served as a board member of the Vermont Forest Products Association, Maine SFI Implementation Committee, Cooperative Forestry Research Unit, and Sportsmen/Forest Landowner Alliance. He and his wife Lilly live in Madison. 

Richard Nass and his wife Joan have been growing trees and living and exploring 135 acres along the Salmon Falls River in Acton for the past 45 years. He has a degree in Math from Union College and earned an MBA from University of New Hampshire. After military service and years working for General Electric and in the New Hampshire Legislature, Richard served eight years in the Maine House of Representatives and another eight years in the Maine Senate, followed by two years in the House Speaker’s Office. Richard served two years as Maine Woodland Owners President.

Nicole Rogers is the Landowner Outreach Forester with the Maine Forest Service (MFS) and brings a wealth of practical knowledge and experience around forest management and silviculture. She received her bachelor’s degree from the University of Maine and her masters degree from Oregon State University. She holds a doctorate in Natural Resource Management from University of Vermont. She was a professor of forest management and silviculture at the University of Maine in Orono. Before that, Rogers was an assistant professor of forestry at University of Maine Fort Kent for three years. A native of Lincolnville, Nicole lives in Hampden with her husband, who is also a forester, and their young child. They manage their family-owned woodlands in Topsfield and Belfast.

Paul Sampson grew up on a 100-acre farm with a father who was an architectural woodworker. From an early age, he was taught to grow and harvest trees, saw and dry lumber, make cabinets, doors and moldings from that lumber. He and his wife, Jula, have run their millwork business, A.E. Sampson & Son, in Warren since 1987. Always willing to learn, Sampson attended his first Maine Woodland Owners event in the mid-1990s, and has been “hooked on the organization ever since.” After volunteering for the Midcoast chapter leader position, he joined the board of directors.

Jeff Tarling is the Tree Warden for Cape Elizabeth and the Urban Forestry Specialist for Maine Audubon. He is a graduate of the University of Southern Maine and a lifelong lover of trees and forests. Before serving in his current roles, Jeff spent over thirty years caring for community forests and parks in Portland. As City Arborist, Jeff managed the city’s 20,000 street and park trees, town forests, municipal landscapes and community gardens. Jeff has served as a board member with the Maine Arborist Association for over twenty years and is a former member of Maine’s Arborist Review Board. Jeff is a resident of South Portland.