TDT trustees are members of Thornhill Development Trust who are elected to the TDT Board to manage and administer the Trust according to its constitution and ensure that the Trust meets its obligations. The trustee role is voluntary.

The current trustees are listed below along with a brief biography (Updated May 2025).

Elaine Blanchard
Elaine grew up in the village, then moved to London after university to work in media. After eight years, she met her now-husband James and his job took them to Singapore in 2003. Elaine moved from sub-editing into feature writing for magazines, then as health correspondent for the only English-speaking broadsheet ‘The Straits Times’, ending working life in Singapore as a freelancer and being on the committee of the St Andrew’s Society. Even though she would come back every year Elaine moved back to the village in December 2018 with James following a few months later.
Early retirement gave her the opportunity to get involved in village life, so she is Treasurer of the Thornhill and Blair Drummond Community Council, Secretary of the North Common Trust, on the editorial team of Thornhill Views, on the Paths Group and, as of July 2022, a TDT trustee.
Elaine spends the rest of her time running an Airbnb, powerlifting, trying and failing to grow tomatoes, trying and failing to play golf and obsessively listening to audiobooks.

Fiona Morison
Fiona has lived in Thornhill since 2017, the longest she has lived anywhere, having had an upbringing which involved moving every couple of years which continued into adult life with her career in international development. Now working in HR for a charity working to prevent people becoming homeless she has worked in operations, communications, events for organisations to include The Belize Red Cross and MSF.
Fiona has a young family with two children who are at the primary school and playgroup and also enjoy the toddler group. The family enjoy the walking, cycling, canoeing which the area offers. Often known as ‘the bee lady’ Fiona and her husband Ben have bees which forage in the village gardens and surrounds with their Mad Hare Apiary honey much in demand. She has been a trustee since August 2024

Joyce Firth
Joyce has lived in Thornhill since 1983 and has seen it through its changes. Always happy to chip in to community activities she became more involved in the work of the Thornhill Development Trust after retiring from the NHS in 2014. Steering Thornhill’s Local Place Plan to registration in July 2024 was very satisfying after a period of intense community effort to make it happen.
Retirement also brought a chance to join a craft group to learn new skills making patchwork quilts. Keeping in touch with friends and family is a daily pleasure and regular visits to France and Sweden with husband David, are keenly anticipated.
Joyce says, “I believe in the collective power of people to get things done,
appreciating different points of view and working together for the common good.
Say ‘Hello’ if you see me out and about!”

Katie Gracie-Orr
Katie grew up in Thornhill, and left (reluctantly, and came home regularly!) for Glasgow to study mechanical engineering. She then stayed in Glasgow to do a PhD in tidal energy and then a job in wind energy, learning useful things like project management, mapping, and multi-party collaboration. She enjoyed the city’s excellent bouldering walls, commuting to work through Kelvingrove Park by bike or running, and eating regular ice cream at Nardini’s.

Katie and her husband Niall (who she met at McLaren High) came back to the village in early 2021 to be home, near family and friends, and give their children, Ruairidh (3) and Caitlin (1), the rural, wild childhood they had themselves. Katie is passionate about community and nature, and the connection between the two. She is very glad to have the opportunity of being a member of the Thornhill Futures team and now a TDT Trustee, and is enjoying the freedom and co-operative nature of grass-roots community work, listening to the village’s needs and working to make things happen.

Richard Waite (Chairperson)
Richard and his wife Sue have lived on Main Street for twenty years. Their two children, Lucy and Angus, flew the nest after going through Thornhill Primary School and McLaren. Richard grew up in London, did all sorts of jobs, moved to the Borders in 1987 to run an outdoor centre and has stayed in God’s own country ever since.  Sue taught at Doune Primary School and Richard is still an independent social worker, the best bit of which, he says, is being involved with the wonderful Lilias Graham Trust on our doorstep. Richard and Sue love to spend time in the hills and in boats and kayaks whenever they can. Richard was active in the early days of TDT, especially with the paths group and became a trustee in December 2020 and took over as Chair in 2022.