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Photo above is
Greg Hiles, President; Duane Sutton,Midwest Chapter
Chairand Chuck Anderson, Past -President ofSDSA. Photo taken by Chelsea Hiles, DeSmet, SD |
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A message from our President
Greg Hiles
Thanks to Poinsett Pounders for hosting the 42nd
Annual SDSA Convention. A GREAT TIME was had by All!
Thanks to all of the businesses and individuals that
donated items for the live and silent auctions. Thank
you to John Green for another original painting for
the auction. Both auctions were a huge success along
with the Everyone Wins Raffle. Thanks again for all of
your efforts and fundraising ideas. The Pounders Get
it Done and Have Fun!
Congratulations to all of the nominees and recipients
of the Snowmobiler of the Year awards and to the
Kennedys for the Hall of Fame recognition.
Thank you to Chuck Anderson for the leadership and
friendship over the last couple of years. I look
forward to working with you and the entire SDSA Board
of Directors. I’m confident we can all work together
to increase membership and grow SDSA’s exposure with
some new advertising ideas.
Jim LeTendre, of Power Brokers, Thank you for sharing
your “View from the Outside”. We all get used to doing
business the same old way! It is good to hear opinions
from others and hopefully we can work together to
implement some of the suggested advertising and
membership ideas to build a strong organization that
will work with and for snowmobilers for many years to
come.
Several old sayings would apply to this:
• Only the strong survive!
• There’s safety in numbers!
• United We Stand, Divided We Fall!
We all need to work together to get the word out to
snowmobilers across the state. We have over 15,000
registered snowmobiles in the state and struggle to
get 1000 members. I think if we can get our message
out to the other owners and non-snowmobilers about
SDSA and:
• how we are working for snowmobile access to public
lands such as forests, parks and public right of way
• the working relationship we have with Game, Fish &
Parks, Governor’s Advisory Council, American Council
of Snowmobile Association (ACSA) and the Clubs across
the state to promote snowmobiling in a positive way
• the economic impact that snowmobiling has in South
Dakota,we should we able to double our membership if
we WORK AT IT.
As I mentioned last month, Power Brokers of Sioux
Falls is running a SDSA Membership Promotion for the
month of November. They will pay $10 of the $20
membership to SDSA for a new member. We have been able
to get some dealerships to pay the other $10 of a new
membership during their open house. Thank You to
Interlakes Sport Center and Roelofsen Implement for
jumping on board and helping build membership and
awareness about SDSA. We should be working with all of
the dealers across the state and hopefully we can make
those contacts very soon!
I need to make a special note of appreciation to the
two employees of SDSA. Mary Anne and Stacy – Thank You
for all you do!
And on a personal note, Diane and I were able to have
two of the five daughters we share spend the weekend
with us at the convention. Thanks girls! It means the
world to me that at age 18 and 21 you still like to
spend time with Dad. In fact I’ll bet there are not
very many Dads that can say their daughter spent her
21st birthday with them. We are proud and honored.
I had better quit rambling and get this to Mary Anne.
Let’s get our trails marked and sleds ready. Hope to
see you on the snow somewhere!
Have a Happy Thanksgiving!
Greg Hiles
A message from our
President- Elect Travis Watkins
Greetings Fellow Snowmobilers,
I’ll start my letter like everyone else probably has
(and that’s okay because it’s true). If you weren’t at
the state convention in Watertown this year, you sure
missed out. Thanks to the Poinsett Pounders for
hosting another great convention.
Congratulations to Dave and Jean Kennedy who were
inducted into the Hall of Fame. Together, they have
put in more hours than any of us will ever know to
promote the sport of snowmobiling and insure the rest
of us have the right to ride, in the Hills and
elsewhere. Thanks Dave and Jean for all your
dedication and hard work.
I’d also like to congratulate Greg Hiles, our new SDSA
president. I’m sure he’ll do a super job leading our
organization. I’d also like to thank Chuck Anderson
for the great work he put in as our president the last
two years. I am honored that you have chosen me to
serve as your president elect, and am looking forward
to the challenge of the job. We’ve got a great group
of board members to work with, and I am excited to see
how we can continue to build our organization.
While the convention is always a nice mix of fun and
business, one of the highlights for me was listening
to the banquet speaker. Jim Le Tendre, owner of
Powerbrokers, Inc., in Sioux Falls, shared some new
and exciting ideas for the future of SDSA. He
especially focused on thinking outside the box as far
as membership and making an impact on legislation
involving riding areas and funding. If you are reading
this, you are likely a member of the SDSA. I want to
challenge each person who reads this to recruit just
one new member by the end of the month, whether it is
someone who has never been a member or someone who has
let their membership lapse in the last few years for
whatever reason. If we all do our part, we could
double our membership by the start of the New Year.
In closing, I’d like to extend some thanks. Thank you
to the Black Hills Snowmobile Club for their extra
$200 donation for the scholarship fund this year.
Thank you, also, to the Town and Country Snow Drifters
for donating their $450 Skidoo club money to the SDSA.
And finally, a big thank you to the Poinsett Pounders
for pulling off an exciting $10,000 cash give away,
which generated another $4000 for the SDSA. A big
thanks as well to the Greg Hiles family for donating
$1000 of their share of the winnings back to the SDSA.
Everyone’s generosity is just one example of the type
of people there are within the snowmobiling community.
With the official kick off of the snowmobiling season
under our belts, all we need now is to finish signing
trails and wait for the snow to fall. I wish you all
lots of powder and safe riding this winter.
Travis Watkins
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