How Trevor Scott Uses His ‘We Are Austin’ Platform to Give Back to the Austin Community

When Trevor Scott isn’t beaming his energetic smile through your television screen, he can be found supporting the community in some way or another. When he steps off the set at KEYE-TV where he co-hosts “We Are Austin,” he might be doing any number of things: manning a food truck for Mobile Loaves and Fishes, emceeing an event for the Austin Humane Society or mentoring young people through OutYouth.

The hard-to-answer question is how someone with such a time-consuming day job finds the energy to give back at this scale. He says his stamina comes from the excitement he feels doing the work: “I’’s the opposite of whatever a vicious circle is: it’s a loving, vivacious circle.”

Once a performer, always a performer

As a self-identifying Air Force brat who moved around a lot, finding community wasn’t always easy for Scott, but he’s always been a performer. When he was little, he used to line up his toys on the bed to play “talk show,” an anecdote he shares with adoration for his younger self. His family eventually settled in Oklahoma for a while, which is when he began acting in school plays. 

In college, he studied journalism and mass communications before landing his first job in television at age 19, working nights in a newsroom. By 2013, he was living in Austin with his now-husband, Davis Covin, and working at KEYE as a producer building a lifestyle program for the network. He spent several years behind the scenes, doing things like choosing graphics, picking a theme song and helping come up with its name: “We Are Austin.” After launching on air and cycling through a few initial hosts, Trevor Scott decided he was ready to be in front of the camera. He auditioned and ended up landing the gig as co-host of the show he helped create. “That is one of those wild twists of the universe that I could never have seen coming.”

Giving Austin organizations a place to call home

Every weekday at 9 a.m., he and his co-star Sierra Waggoner speak to Austinites through their award-winning program where they enthusiastically showcase things like local events and adoptable puppies. They often end up dedicating airtime to some of the organizations Scott donates his time to. 

For example, earlier this summer, Scott hosted a segment with Impact Arts, an educational theatre nonprofit. Teen actors from the organization came on to talk about their summer stock performances of “Newsies” and “Cinderella.” Scott has no formal role with their organization, but because his personal adolescence was spent on stage, he’s one of its biggest fans, claiming a few unofficial job titles: “part mentor, part booster, best friend forever and ardent supporter.”

To the many Austinites that Trevor Scott serves, it’s clear he is the same person on-camera that he is when he leaves the studio each day. In an alternate reality, one where he’s not on television, he’d still be finding ways to help the community; giving back is just such a part of who he is. “I think that a lot of what I’m doing within this role, through this job and with this platform is just what I would be already doing in life … It allows me to be Trevor Scott, but in an amplified, big, impactful way.”