Happy July. Hope everyone is liking the rain these last couple of days. July’s meeting was called to order July 8th at Hoot’s Café. Thank you all those that came. And special thank you to Jennie Fischer, Ralph Rau and Jeff Shinn with the Forest Service for coming down and talking to us.
1. Meeting with the Forest Supervisor Cheryl Probert. On June 5th, Dean, Don and Brenda took a trip to Kamiah to visit with Cheryl. Some of the topics that we went over are the following: how the club got started, what we do, trail work on existing trails, trails that we would like to see open, and UTV’s. We said we support the new UTV ruling “50 inches or less. Hopefully we put some ideas in the pot for that. We will just have to wait and see what will come about it.
2. Quick topics that we went over: Jill Foryth has retired. We need to help educate those on the trails about what is the correct way or methods. Talk to Jeremy about getting a list of trails in the Elk City area and their level of riding rating. And hopefully after October we can get Jeremy to come to a meeting and explain the How comes, Why’s for trails getting money or worked over before others.
3. Trail work: Most of the trail ranger trails are opened up and papers are turned in. With that, there was a lot of down trees this year. This is why some of the trails are taking a little bit longer. But as some of you are finding one time the trail is cut open. Then the next time you ride it, it has trees down again. All I can say is with the winds and the dead trees that are out there. Take a saw. We can’t keep up.
4. The special part of the meeting was with Jennie Fischer, Ralph Rau and Jeff Shinn. They came down to go over the Grandview Plan and maps.
a. Clearwater Forest, there is some changes to the motorcycle trails. We will have to get with High Mountain Trail Machine Association and get their input on the trails. This way, when we make our comments next month, we can include them.
b. Nezperce trails for ATV’s, we need to look closely to all the trails. First make sure all of the trails we propose earlier made it back on there. Second to what the key says for closures. Some of the trails will have different Seasonal closures. (Do to Elk Range)
c. We took some time and looked at the maps and couple of the members took maps home with papers to go over. We will be calling a special meeting to go over comments and tails with the club members by the end of the month. Then pull another meeting with Jennie Fischer to go over concerns and questions that we have. By the middle of August we should have our concerns turned in to the Missoula office and Jennie. Along with that, we are needing to have all members that have commented before to write in as well. All comments have go with what is in the package now. We can’t comment on new ones. Alternative 5 is the one to focus on. And Alternative 2 is what we have now.
5. We would like to thank everyone that helped out with work days this year. Looking at some of the reports turned in, it was tuff and long days. And not very big crews. We understand that every body is busy. But this club works hard to keep trails open for the public. If it wasn’t for our club members opening trails, a lot of the trails would be still full of trees and not passable.
The Forest Service are short handed and can’t get around to all the trails. They rely on clubs like ours to do the work to specs. So again to those that cleaned trails on work days. THANK YOU!!
6. Next meeting will be August 5th for the monthly meeting. As soon as I know when everyone is ready to go over maps, I will send out a notice for that Special meeting.
Rides for 2015: Next ride will be September
All Meeting @ Hoot’s Café in White Bird 7:00Pm first Wed. of every month!!
· August 5
· September 2
·October 7
·November 4
·December 32
Just a reminder when you are mailing in your dues please fill out a membership form. This is the paper trail that says you paid for me. You can get a membership from the Web page or call me And I will get you one.
For those that are interested or needing the ATV class. We are still giving it. Call 839-2303 and get scheduled in. All kids that ride an OHV on public trails or roads with out a drivers license, need to take the class.
