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December 2004 Newsletter On November 8th, 2004 at the Lacona VFW Hall, we held our monthly meeting. President Ed McGrew called the meeting to order at 7:20 pm and twenty-one members were present for this meeting. We also had a special guest speaker from Trialpass by the name of Lee Ann Harris. The minutes from the October’s meeting were read. Dave Beyer made the motion to accept the minutes as read, with no amendments and John Wood seconded it. All those present were in favor. Old Business: President Ed McGrew said that he would still have to pursue getting “membership boxes” in place at area dealerships. Due to the fact that his lovely wife and him just became first time parents, he has been a little pre-occupied. He said he would try to get this idea in motion as soon as possible. Faron stated that he has been able to change the format of the newsletter to help our web-site administrator with being able to post it to our web site. As far as he knew it must be working out, as he has not heard back from Greg Hall, our web site Tech Editor. Faron also advised us that, along with Dave Beyer’s help, he did get our “domain name” of www.nytronny.com re-registered with “Network Solutions” for the voted upon time-frame of 5 years at a cost of $19.95 per year. New Business: Treasurer’s Report:
Patty Miller made the motion to accept the Treasurer’s Report as read and Aretha Manchester seconded the motion. All those present were in favor. Membership Coordinator’s Report: 72 Memberships with 155 Members Bills were presented to the members for approval. President Ed McGrew had a bill for $45.00 for the cost of the pizza for the November’s meeting. Faron Cronk had two bills. One was for $99.95 for reimbursement to him for using his credit card to pay the re-registering of our domain name with Network Solutions. And the other was for $7.40 for the cost of postage for mailing out newsletters. Ralph Miller made the motion to pay the bills and Kevin Helinger seconded it. All those present were in favor.
Faron reminded us of the Christmas Parade in
Watertown on Sunday the 28th of November. He said that he had
received an email from our VP Mike Bellinger stating that we were to line up on
South Pleasant Street off of State Street. It is very important to be on time as
close to12:00 noon as we can, so everyone will be in line and ready to go. As we
have done in the past, we will drop the machines in the line up and take our
vehicles to the parking lot on Sherman & Mullin Street. We will have people
there to coordinate transporting of people back to South Pleasant Street. Anyone
interested in planning a Patty Miller read us a clipping from the Lewis County / Lowville newspaper and the article was titled “Legislative committee will research the possibility of a multi-use trail system on county owned forest lands.” Much discussion was done in regards to this article and its looking like we need to keep our eyes and ears opened to what is going on up on the Tug Hill Region. Our guest speaker, Lee Ann Harris from Trailpass, then took over and began to introduce herself and what Trailpass is and what they are trying to do for our recreational sport. She informed us that Trailpass has now secured a $2 million dollar general blanket liability policy that allows clubs nationwide to participate in the Trailpass Insurance program. Trailpass insurance will insure an ATV Club and the landowner whose trail is in their network system. Each landowner would be listed as an additional insured to their main policy. She said that their insurance policy is very similar to the snowmobile club’s insurance. They have engaged Cool Insuring Agency, Inc. to purchase a general Liability Insurance for their organization and all of its Member Clubs. This would be the AGI Insurance Policy that is underwritten by the Lexington Insurance Co. This insurance does insure the landowners for our trails on their land for $525 per mile that is paid by Trailpass. She informed us that our club could become an “Affiliated Club” by hosting our trails into their network. Our cost would be $750 for the first 50 members and $10 for each member thereafter. She also informed us that Trailpass has a “trail fund” that clubs are eligible to draw funds from for maintenance and equipment expenses. This fund is made up of 20% of the monies taken in by Trailpass for the passes that they sell and is divided amongst the clubs that are in their network, based upon the amount of miles of trials that each club has. Clubs have the option of opting out of the “trail fund” so as Trailpass would then pickup the tap on the “hosting clubs” membership fee. She informed us that Trailpass would provide us with a trained forester to come out and look over our trails to see what we would need for signs and any trail improvements. Trailpass would provide us with all the signage that would be required, at no cost to our club. Many of our members had some constructive questions for Lee Ann and she did a great job of answering them. She had a couple of questions that she had to get back to us on with more accurate information. One of the questions was if they could provide us with the information on what Trailpass sold for passes and how much went into the trail fund? Another question was why her handout for the Insurance policy was lacking some pages and if she could get us an updated and accurate copy to us? She said that she would look into these questions and get back to us as soon as possible. Nancy Fox made the motion to adjourn our meeting at 8:50 pm and Ralph Miller seconded it. All those present were in favor. Upcoming Events / Rides: November 28th, 2004: Watertown Christmas Parade will be on this day. Lining up will start at 12:00 noon SHARP. You’ll want to decorate your machines and come ride your ATV down the main street of Watertown. We will be gathering on South Pleasant Street off from State Street. December 13th, 2004: Our December’s monthly meeting will be held at the Lacona VFW on this day. We will be getting started at 7:00 pm SHARP. All members are encouraged to come. July 22nd – 24th, 2005: Brasher Falls Weekend Getaway. Everyone should call the folks at the Riverside Campgrounds before then, but not until next year to help save any confusion or the folks losing your reservation over the winter. The number to call after May 1st, 2005 is (315) 389-4771. December Birthday Wishes:
NYTRO OF NNY “A
Division of the New York Trail Riders Organization, Inc.” |