State lawmaker finishing 1,000-mile trek to Capitol

By Aaron Gould Sheinin

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Austin Scott is sweaty, and his pant cuffs are streaked with mud. Storm clouds gather on the southern horizon.

On a day he’s walking 16.7 miles, this part of Thursday’s trek isn’t going to be easy.

But after making it this far, Scott is still smiling.

On Saturday, the state representative and 2010 Republican gubernatorial hopeful will wrap up his 1,000-mile, 64-day odyssey at the state Capitol and then, literally, put his aching feet up.

“I’m going to be the workhorse in the race,” Scott says Thursday, as he picks his way through knee-high grass along Ga. 9 south of Cumming. “That’s what’s going to set us apart.”

Scott is a long shot for the Republican nomination. Five others are running; two of them are statewide office holders, and a third is a former state senator and veteran member of Congress. Scott has been in the House for 14 years, but as a lawmaker from Tifton, he lacks the name identification and deep-pocketed donors that typically propel a statewide victory.

He needed another way. A friend was a Florida native versed in how Lawton Chiles’ 1,000-mile walk across that state in 1970 propelled the then-state legislator to the U.S. Senate. Chiles became known as “Walkin’ Lawton” and later won the Florida governorship.

Scott, a fit 40-year-old, liked the idea. He took his first steps in Chickamauga on June 27. He skimmed the edge of the state all the way around to the town of Clayton in the northeast corner.

There, he turned for Atlanta.

All in the same pair of boots.

“I’ve worn this one pair almost the whole way,” Scott says, a blast of air from a semi-truck a welcome relief from the heat. “You have to take care of your feet or they’ll blister on you. Not that they don’t blister on you anyway. We got through that after several weeks.”

A typical day begins before the sun comes up. The portable GPS unit clipped to his belt tells him the exact point he stopped the day before. He returns to that spot the next morning.

And he walks. If he comes across someone, he stops, hands out a card. “Hey, there, my name is Austin Scott, and I’m running for governor. What would you do if you were governor for a day?” he asks.

The overwhelming answer is increase funding for public education. “People, all across this state, in affluent areas and poor areas, are truly concerned about it,” Scott says.

As he talks, a man driving a pickup offers his opinion with a raised middle finger and speeds off north toward Cumming.

Beyond education, he hears most often about transportation and water.

Around midday, he stops for lunch. Sometimes he’s arranged to meet leaders in whatever community he’s in. He’s done more than 60 interviews with newspapers and radio and TV stations.

He’s got a team of three, plus his wife, Vivien, who form a traveling support crew. An SUV, emblazoned with “Scott for Governor,” ferries water and picks him up and drops him off.

Most of the time, he says, he’s alone. One guy walked 10 miles with Scott wearing flip-flops. Others will walk a mile or two and go back to their lives.

At least 10 people a day stop to offer him a ride.

“I’ve never taken up any of the offers for a lift,” he says, smiling at the thought of slicing off a few miles like a marathoner who jumps on the subway for a few stops. “That would be cheating.”

He’s stayed nights in an RV at state parks, at supporters’ homes, in occasional Days Inns.

The most difficult day, he said, was not the 31-mile walk into Washington in the rain. No, that would be July 12, Day 16, south of Columbus, 20 miles on U.S. 27.

“It was hot,” Scott says. “There were a lot of hills, and virtually no cars.”

He has lost 7 pounds and a couple of inches off his waist. All of that, even though “a good part of the trip is stopping and eating at every diner you pass.”

The walk itself, he says, isn’t going to win the race. He also knows he won’t raise $10 million.

No, what the walk does, he says, is lay the groundwork.

“When I go back into those communities, there will be more interest in us as a candidate than there would be the first time,” he says. “Citizens in the state of Georgia have been able to contact us through our Web site, walk with us, tell us what they’d do as governor for a day.”

He stops for lunch around 12:15, 10 miles into the day.

“We’ve eaten a lot of Subway on this trip,” he says.

There are six more miles to go. Rain is coming. But it’s OK. He has a jacket if he needs it. And a pair of dry socks.