SCORR NEWS

Hello fellow Off Road Riders!

I hope you all have gotten out and done some riding this spring! We had an excellent SCORR meeting this past May 8th – great attendance, got a lot done, and some good direction for this summer! Before I get into details of the last meeting, let me first get a few upcoming dates out there:

May 31st – The first Trail Maintenance Day of the summer! This one will be at the Tenderfoot Mountain/Dillon Cemetery riding area. The tentative plan is to meet at 8:30am, work till 12:30pm, and then ride! PLEASE REPLY IF YOU ARE PLANNING ON WORKING SO WE CAN HAVE ENOUGH TOOLS – let me who you are bringing if you are bringing friends or family to help. I will send out the specifics on about May 23rd after we have the specific project planned in my meeting with the Forest Service on site on the 22nd.
June 5th – Next SCORR meeting – once again at 6:30 pm at the Summit County Community and Senior Center at 0151 Peak One Blvd. in Frisco, CO. The Center is at the intersection of Peak One Blvd. and Highway 9 – the stop light intersection where you turn off highway 9 to get to the Colorado Motor Vehicle and Driver’s License offices or the recycling center in Frisco.

May 8, 2008 Meeting Minutes:

George Gangler of COHVCO’s TIGeR Teams came and did a presentation on the importance of being sure all of the trails we ride being part of the Forest Service Inventory. The latest version on the Travel Management Plan will be out later this summer at which time there is a comment period where the Forest Service will consider feedback on their plan and possibly make some changes. Once the plan is approved – as early as next summer, any trail not on the Motor Vehicle Use Map (MVUM), will be closed! Any trail not in their inventory has no hope of remaining open. Please contact me if you would like to be involved in the inventory process.
State Parks OHV Grant – I personally delivered our completed grant request on Thursday May 15th to the State Parks Offices in Littleton. Once our grant request is approved, we will have funding to plan new trails in the Tenderfoot Mountain area, fund the NEPA research (environmental impact), build information Kiosks at the trail heads, and build a buck-n-rail fence around the wetland (necessary to get our riding area approved. There was a lot of money left after the winter grant application process was complete and another opportunity came up and we decided to apply. When our grant was submitted there were 17 other grant applications submitted. We may have to go make a presentation to their approval committee before they decide which applications to fund – and we still need to get our 501c3 non-profit tax deductable status approval before we could get the funds. Several of our members worked very hard to get this application package ready and I want to recognize them here – Kent McGrew, Fred Niggeler, Drew Goldsmith, and Ken Waugh of the U. S. Forest Service.

FDRD – Friends of the Dillon Ranger District – one of our partners in trail maintenance once again offered trail crew leader training. This year Rebecca Jeche has stepped up to become a crew leader – Thanks Rebecca! She joins Greg Guras, Dave Love, and myself in increasing our capability to get trail maintenance done to preserve our riding privilege. If there are any others who want to become crew leaders, please contact Maggie Gaddis of the FDRD at fdrd.maggie@gmail.com
SCORR Trail Maintenance Days – please mark your calendars and plan to help out at a few of these events. They are a lot of fun, preserve our riding privilege, build confidence with our partners at the Forest Service, county, and towns, and we ride in the afternoon!
May 31st - The first Trail Maintenance Day of the summer! This one will be at the Tenderfoot Mountain/Dillon Cemetery riding area. The tentative plan is to meet at 8:30am, work till 12:30pm, and then ride! PLEASE REPLY IF YOU ARE PLANNING ON WORKING SO WE CAN HAVE ENOUGH TOOLS – let me who you are bringing if you are bringing friends or family to help. I will send out the specifics on about May 23rd after we have the specific project planned in my meeting with the Forest Service on site on the 22nd.

June 28th – Golden Horseshoe
July 13th – Tenderfoot Mountain
August 2nd – Golden Horseshoe
August 23rd – Tenderfoot Mountain
September 6th – TBA
October 11th – TBA

Summit Mountain Challenge Mountain Bike Race Support – Once again this summer we are providing moto support at select SMC races. Our support goes a LONG way to improve our image with the mountain bike trail user group and does help us politically. This year Jason Eckart will be organizing our presence there – Thanks Jason! If you are interested in helping one or more of these dates please contact Jason at 970-333-6671. The Wednesday events start at about 5:45 and the weekend events are a lot of the day starting in the morning. Here are the dates:

o June 14th – Saturday – Tour d’Trash – Summit County Land Fill/Tenderfoot Mountain
o June 25th – Wednesday – Gold Run Rush – Golden Horseshoe
o July 4th - Friday– Firecracker 50 – Baldy Mountain/Golden Horseshoe
o August 13th – Wednesday – Pennsylvania Gulch Grind – Boreas Pass/Pennsylvania Gulch/Blue River Trail
o September 7th – Sunday – Fall Classic – Baldy Mountain/Golden Horseshoe

· SCORR now has a committee to research and put together a response to the Hidden Gems Wilderness expansion proposal. Jeff Steele has volunteered to chair this committee. Thanks Jeff! This is an important project and will have a huge impact on protecting all of our OHV privileges far into the future. Committee members are needed and all those interested please contact Jeff at (970) 468-0958 or steelejeep@msn.com
· In a effort to promote the club, its meetings, and its events better, Wallace Plowden has volunteered to head up what we are calling our Marketing and Public Relations Committee. Thanks Wallace! Anyone who has contacts at the newspapers, town events organizers, or anyone who could help promote SCORR please contact Wallace at (970) 389-6499 wallace_plowden@yahoo.com
· Skylar Steele has volunteered to set up a SCORR MySpace based club calendar and forum linked to our website. As soon as we get this going I’ll forward the site information to everyone.

Thanks for reading all this! PLEASE REPLY IF YOU ARE COMING TO THE MAY 31ST TRAIL MAINTENANCE DAY –chuckginsburg@comcast.net

April 3, 2008 Meeting:

We had a good meeting Thursday night April 3rd and we got a lot done. Here are the highlights of the meeting:

Lisa and Kurt with the Colorado Environmental Coalition made their presentation on the Hidden Gems wilderness expansion proposal to the club. Most of the areas that they are proposing do not have trails or roads that we ride within them that those of us at the meeting knew of. Please go to www.whiteriverwild.org and study the maps to see if there are trails that we specifically need to bring to their attention that we would like to still be able to ride so maybe we could get them to adjust their proposal. For those of you who snowmobile there are several areas that would be affected. We need to specifically fight for the areas that are in jeopardy.
Our Grant Application with the State Parks OHV Grant Program is going well. We have most of the application completed and we are looking to collect the letters of support from our partners in the project such as the US Forest Service in Dillon, Summit County Open Space and Trails, COHVCO, and other organizations. The biggest item we still need completion on is our 501c3 status – that is pending but is crucial to our success of getting the grant. We need this grant money to come thru to show the county and the town governments that we can help or they may not be able to be behind keeping our trails open because of maintenance and funding issues.
We have now planned several trail maintenance dates for this summer. Please add these to your calendar, tell your friends, and plan to help out. Most of these dates will be a similar plan to last year where we will work on the projects in the morning and ride in the afternoon. Details of where the specific dates projects will be held to be decided on soon. Here are the dates:

1. May 31
2. June 28
3. July 12
4. August 2
5. August 23
6. September 6
7. October 11

Guff Van Vooren and Maggie Gaddis of the Friends of the Dillon Ranger District were also at the meeting to present their Forest Stewards Program to SCORR. There are many ways to participate in that program but their Trail Crew Leader Training Program is very important to SCORR so we can get enough of our membership certified to lead projects so we can lead our own projects. Please look over the email I sent just before this one about the opportunity to be involved with this program.
We did not discuss this at the last meeting but I think SCORR needs to start having regular board meetings on a monthly basis rather than general membership meetings. Of course, all members are welcome at each board meeting but we need to have a core group of individuals who commit to being on the board, attending as many of the monthly meetings as possible, and to work their board position and its responsibilities. If you are interested in being a board member, please contact me as soon as possible. Information from the board meetings will be sent to all members after each meeting.

November 1st, 2007 Meeting:

WOW! There are a lot of things that need our attention this even this time of year! Although a lot of you have put your dirt bike away and are planning your first day snowmobiling, skiing, and snowboarding we still have a lot of issues that need our attention if we are interested in protecting our dwindling riding privileges! Our sport as we know it will not survive without help from ALL of you! How will you feel when you see that CLOSED sign at the beginning of your favorite trail? It can happen – and it will happen if we ALL are not working towards a common goal!

Anyway, here’s the report from “the Front”…

Lisa Smith from the Colorado Environmental Coalition was at the meeting presenting their Hidden Gems Wilderness Proposal – they are looking at adding about 600,000 acres of Wilderness to the White River National Forest! AKA – lots of “Closed to Motor Vehicles” signs! While many areas they are proposing do not have motorized trails there are many areas that do and we need to be sure that they know we oppose any motorized trail closures. The problem is that they do not know about all of the trails is any of the areas they are proposing for wilderness. PLEASE go to their website www.whiteriverwild.org and study their proposal. List trails that we ride within any of their proposed areas and come to the next meeting so we can combine all of our information and see how much of their proposal we can cut sections out of to maintain our riding areas. THIS IS IMPORTANT! They are drumming up support for their plan so when they go to congress/senate with their plan, the Congressmen and Senators will be ready to push the proposal thru to law…ouch! We need to fight this every step of the way first by cutting holes in it and next by fighting against their final proposal! There are several things that need to happen before it can become a grim reality – first, they need to wait for the Travel Management Plan (TMP) to be finalized before they can move to the next stage of their draft maps (this could help or hinder us depending on how the TMP plays out), then sell their draft proposal to the public, then to the Congressmen and Senators. We are not in this alone – COHVCO, the Blue Ribbon Coalition, and the AMA are also fighting this battle – please give generously to help them fight the legal battles for the cause as well!
We need someone to lead and a few helpers to file a Grant Proposal with Colorado State Parks for an Off-Highway Vehicle Grant. This money will go a long way in helping us maintain our trails, trailheads, trail system planning and engineering (can you say Tenderfoot Mountain?) trail signage, kiosks, and capital equipment to perform the work. The application deadline is coming up quick – 5:00pm December 3rd, 2007. There is big money there for the asking! There are several people from Friends of the Dillon Ranger District and Summit County Open Space and Trails that have told me they could give guidance and answer questions on this process. Please contact me soon if you can help with this project.
Our 501c3 application has been filed and I am told we will be set by the end of the year. This is important because we can apply for the grant with our 501c3 application done but we cannot receive the funds until we ARE a 501c3.
Mike Hawkins met with some of the Summit County Commissioners and got a very good feeling that they are excited with the work we have started and they are looking forward to working with us more and more in the future. They did tell Mike that the Breckenridge Town Council is not as excited as they are. We need to work to get them on our side because they hold a lot of power in the Golden Horseshoe along with the County and the Forest Service.

More meeting minutes...

Mini ATV Raffle – we sold 10 more tickets at the meeting but we still need to sell more to only break even on the cost of the mini ATV. Please, if you have kids buy a few tickets to help support the club! Who knows, if you win you’ll make your kid extremely happy!
SCORR T-Shirts – sold one at the meeting so there are still some left. As you know, they are $20.00 each. I have attached the photos for the shirts so if you are interested, mail a check to SCORR at my address below with the sizes you want and $5.00 shipping and I will ship them to you.
Tenderfoot Mountain GPS Project – The Forest Service is currently trying to put a “spaghetti” trail system file that Fred Niggeler GPSed (THANKS FRED!!) onto a map so we can put together a plan on how to GPS each specific trail in the format that the Forest Service needs so we can get them into their plan for a off-road motorcycle riding area on Tenderfoot Mountain. This is a VERY IMPORTANT project for first thing this spring to get all of our trails on Tenderfoot Mountain GPSed. The Forest Service actually came to us with their proposal to make that area a designated riding area! Let’s make it happen!
Proposed Trail Maintenance Days for summer’08. There are two dates per month listed below but we want to keep it to one day per month. As we get closer we will vote on the days to maximize our participation. There was also a suggestion to have a brief SCORR meeting just before each maintenance day to keep the word out on Club happenings and issues. Here’s the list…
1. May 3 – Tenderfoot Mountain
2. May 17 - Tenderfoot Mountain
3. June 14 – Golden Horseshoe
4. June 28 – Golden Horseshoe
5. July 12 – Golden Horseshoe
6. July 19 – Golden Horseshoe
7. August 2 – Golden Horseshoe
8. August 23 – Golden Horseshoe
9. September 6 – Golden Horseshoe
10. September 13 - Golden Horseshoe – the last trail maintenance day to be part of a recognition/party/riding weekend to recognize volunteers, BBQ, give away prizes, ride hard, camp out, and just have fun!

October 4, 2007 Meeting:

Thanks to everyone who attended last month’s SCORR club meeting and thanks to Mike Stoveken at Silverthorne Motorsports for being our meeting host. Everyone that attended received a free brand new Yamaha YZ450F (or at least got to sit on one)!

Here is a summary of the activities we currently have going on in our club:

- T-shirts – We have a few of our highly acclaimed SCORR t-shirts left. They are $20 each.

- Trail Maintenance – Our club led three trail maintenance projects this summer in Summit County with local forest service and open space agency personnel. Not only did our work help in maintaining trails for OHV use, but it helped build a foundation for collaboration with our local land managers. Our own Chuck Ginsburg received the Summit County Volunteer of the Year award for his unselfish and tireless commitment in time to these and other projects in which he has been involved.

- SCORR Membership – Our SCORR club membership is now up to 231 members!

- 501c3 non-profit application is in progress and our goal is to have it finished by the new year.

- Club Finances – Our club finances stand to improve based on member donations and our fundraising efforts. Please buy ATV raffle tickets, SCORR t-shirts, and donate to your club!

- Tenderfoot Mountain GPS Project – We are in the middle of GPSing trails in Summit County’s Tenderfoot Mountain area for submission to the US Natl Forest for inclusion in the Travel Mgmt Plan. We are also in discussion to reroute some trails and add some trails to create “loops” to improve the riding experience.

- 2008 Planning – We will soon be thinking about the activities we plan to pursue in 2008. We are open to suggestions and are looking for more volunteers to help us. Activities will include trail maintenance, club rides, fund raising, membership drives and working at regional events like the Thunder Valley MX and the EnduroCross,

- Protection of our OHV privilege – While we have made great progress in building our reputation as responsible recreationists through our trail maintenance volunteer efforts, we continue to be challenged from extremist individuals and groups who want to close down more trails and areas in Summit County. We need EVERYONE to be diligent in voicing your concerns constructively in support of maintaining multiple use on our trails. This includes calling, visiting and writing with national forest service personnel, open space personnel, county commissioners, etc. We also need volunteers who are willing to write letters and responses to local, state and federal officials. If you can help in this regard, please contact us! There are several efforts underway including shutting down the Sallie Barber road to OHVs and converting parts of Summit County to wilderness that we all need to rally against.

Here is a summary of the activities we currently have going on in our club:

- Club Ride – Please let us know if you would be interested in a club on the western slope on the weekend of Nov 10th with your preference for destination, e.g. Rabbit Valley, White Sands

- ATV Raffle – This is the last week to buy raffle tickets for our ATV Raffle drawing. Please let us know if you would like to be included in the raffle.

- T-shirts – We have a few of our highly acclaimed SCORR t-shirts left. They are $20 each.

- Club Finances – Our club finances stand at ???? based on member donations and our fundraising efforts

SCORR NEWS

May 8, 2008 Meeting Minutes:

April 3, 2008 Meeting:

November 1st, 2007 Meeting:

October 4, 2007 Meeting: