As the EVOSTC Program Officer, Austin oversees the Council's habitat protection and enhancement projects, working with project proponents and other partners to successfully bring projects to completion. She also assists with other program and administrative tasks as needed. Austin has worked as a contractor for the Council since 2019, with a brief break during her time serving as Anchorage's Acting Mayor. Before 2019, she worked at Great Land Trust as the Land Transactions & Legal Affairs Director, where she successfully led a number of EVOSTC-funded habitat protection projects. Prior to working for Great Land Trust, Austin worked at a large, private law firm; served as in house counsel to the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency, a bi-state regulatory body tasked with protecting Lake Tahoe; and clerked for a federal magistrate judge in Alaska. She also served on the Anchorage Assembly representing West Anchorage from 2018 to 2023.
Austin is originally from a rural logging town in northern California, but Alaska has been home since 2011. Austin has an undergraduate degree in Environmental Studies from UC Santa Barbara and a law degree from UC Davis. She lives in Anchorage with her wife Stephanie, their son Wilder, and their two dogs, Dexter and Cleo.
