A lot has happened in 2016 and I think it's time for a state of events summary.

Probably everyone knows at this point that the plans for professionally built trail at Blue Mound have been delayed. The lawsuit filed by Kenneth Wade and Karl Heil against the DNR regarding the approval of a new snowmobile trail in the new Amendment to the Master Plan had the unfortunate side effect of causing the DNR to halt all plans spelled out in the Amendment, including the bike trail improvements.

Just for added complication, the operating agreement between CORP and the DNR, our Memorandum of Understanding (or MOU) is expired and a new one is currently under negotiation.

Despite the delays, we have DNR approval for some improvements to Chert Dip and Holy Schist trails. Our club work day on May 14th will be devoted to Holy Schist. In the course of its boundary survey (done as part of the Amendment documentation), the DNR found a second place where the trail was sited over the border and into a neighbor's land. That is unfortunate, but given the delays with our plans for the other trails, now is the perfect time to deal with this issue before it becomes a bigger problem. The fact that the trail in question has become eroded and in need of repairs anyhow makes it a good use of our time while we are waiting for the legal issues to be resolved.

While we are making good use of our treasured volunteer time in Holy Schist, we are working with the DNR and the Friends of Blue Mound to determine if it's possible to put together a professionally built repair of part of Chert Dip Trail.

The reason that this remains a possibility despite the restrictions resulting from the lawsuit over the Amendment is part of Chert Dip, the far northern end (the Dip), was to be cut off from the proposed Beginner Loop project and treated as intermediate-expert trail at a later date.

Because the DNR accepted our proposal to repair part of the Dip by hand this year, we took a second look at the issue and asked them if fixing the entire Dip using professional help was a possibility. The folks at the DNR agreed to evaluate the new proposal. That's where it stands.

In the mean time, I've asked the Friends to put me on the May schedule to discuss the possibility of their agreeing to fund the majority of the work. As you may recall, CORP received the benefit of a very generous fund raiser at Machinery Row this spring. I've obtained approval to use the money to seed the funding of Travis Bellman's work on the Dip. He has supplied me an estimate for his cost to do the work and penciled the project into his schedule.

To summarize: the DNR is evaluating our proposal to have 2/3 mile of Chert Dip professionally built and we are working on getting the money to pay for it.

Thanks to everyone who has been working behind the scenes to keep things moving ahead at Blue Mound. The last nine months have generated a lot of anxiety, raised expectations, and now disappointment. It's important to keep events in perspective: despite that which has gone wrong, no one involved is working directly against us, and nothing gained has been rejected.

The best thing we can do at this time is to keep showing up for work.

Walter Hougas

Where do we sign up to volunteer at the HHH?

Update July 17th, 2017:

There's always one more shoe to drop when dealing with the DNR.

The Heritage Survey found a protected bird in the area we will be working in, which means no machinery in the Chert Dip area until September. This finding will affect our ability to move ahead next year too. We're trying to find a responsible way to deal with the situation.

I've contacted Travis and he has kindly agreed to shift his schedule around to accommodate this change. The Friends are sticking with us too. Gary and I are working with Mike Repyak at the DNR to wrap up the details so work can start this fall.

The Horribly Hilly Hundreds was another massive success. We had three volunteers from CORP participate.

In the mean time, the park suffered a significant rain event in June that did damage to the trails. Then there was a big windstorm that dropped 20+ trees on the trail. We've got the deadfall under control, but it put our weed cutting efforts back another week. We could really use some help with the weed cutting.

The second boundary reroute in Holy Schist we started this spring is not yet complete. It will get done this year, but all the other issues have forced this badly needed work down the priority list.

I apologize for the developing problems with erosion in Gniess and Smooth (what a name!). The DNR's choice of responding to the Amendment lawsuit by halting all trail work associated with it was unfortunate. We're faced with the choice of diverting effort away from other problem trail issues to deal with an area that will all be completely redone anyway, or allowing the erosion to spiral out of control. We're doing the best we can, but it's come to the point where unless we get more help, some things are just going to get ugly (uglier?).

Don't forget that MadCityDirt Fest is coming up August 13th.