DOES THE RAF MISSION MOVE YOU TO ACTION?

Are you willing to help preserve, improve and create airstrips for recreational access? Consider joining the RAF volunteer team!


Here are areas we’d love your help:


State Liaison: Help lead the charge in your state toward the preservation and creation of recreational airstrips. Our Liaisons are a dedicated group of volunteers; if you have passion and time to get involved, please let us know.


Event Planner: If you love events and your talent is creating invitations, working with people, and keeping details organized, we’d love to hear from you.

VP of Appreciation: Our upbeat team enjoys handwriting personal notes to our many donors. The RAF is known for its “high touch” approach and grateful spirit. Does this appeal to you?

Do you have a knack for public policy? Join John Nadeau, RAF’s citizen expert on Recreational Use statutes. Get into the nitty-grittty of this important initiative, and get fulfillment protecting airfield landowners.


We’d love to talk to those with passion for the RAF mission willing to lend a hand! We train and support our wonderful volunteers, and are looking forward to our next twenty years together. Contact RAF Volunteer Coordinator Erin White, ewhite@theraf.org.

Submitted December 29, 2023.
By Carmine Mowbray

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By Taylin Trafton • December 11, 2025
A Christmas gift of flight lessons from his parents started Scott Anttila’s aviation journey in 1985. “I learned at Johnson Field, a small grass strip tucked into the woods in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, and that early exposure to simple backcountry flying stuck with me,” Scott says. Growing up in the U.P., he spent a lot of time outdoors and found that flying was another way to get to the places he liked to explore—especially the ones most people never saw. As he earned more ratings and eventually moved to the Detroit area for work, Scott realized he needed a way to stay connected to northern Michigan. He bought an airplane and used it to get back to the smaller airstrips and lake country he enjoyed. Along the way, he also flew gliders out of Frankfort, soaring along the Sleeping Bear Dunes and towing sailplanes over the Great Lakes. “Those flights gave me a different appreciation for the landscape and made me even more interested in the small, out-of-the-way airports scattered around the state,” he says. Visiting those kinds of places, Scott first came across the Recreational Aviation Foundation. He started using RAF-supported airstrips both inside and outside Michigan. “I noticed how well-kept they were and how much access they opened up,” he says, adding, ”Over the years, I’ve watched a number of grass strips close, which made the RAF’s mission feel especially important to me. Maintaining these airstrips keeps aviation connected to the outdoors and makes it possible for more people to reach the quiet, remote areas that inspired me to fly in the first place.” Scott joins the other two RAF Michigan Liaisons, General Grant and Tanmoy Ganguly. He can be reached at santtila@theraf.org . Submitted December 11, 2025.