Meeting Summary, April 6, 2017

Attending: Palmer, Gosselin, Hultgren, Yakovleff, Manizza, Santasiere, Ferron

The meeting began at 6:37 pm in the Nash Zimmer Transportation Center. The meeting summary for the March 2, 2017 meeting was reviewed and approved by consensus.

Hultgren reported that 13 individual memberships and 2 organizational/business memberships have been received to date and the money has been transferred to the bank account (from PayPal). Two of the memberships were by direct payment and as such did not have the $.74 (4.9%) deducted from them.

He said that using the templates that Pierce prepared he had ordered some small window stickers for the individual members and a few larger window stickers for the business members, but they had not been received as yet. He will distribute these to the members when they are received. (The 20 smaller stickers cost $24.94 and the 5 larger stickers cost $33.83 (total), which were paid for directly out of the checking account using PayPal.)

An additional announcement about the available memberships will be sent out to the email list this month. Palmer said he would prepare a form for joining via check or cash (in person or by mail) rather than on-line via the website.

Coming events were discussed. On April 18th Bike Mansfield will have a table at the UConn Earth Day celebration on Fairfield Way from 11 to 2 and anyone who can stop by to help staff the table is welcome. Hultgren will bring the banner, some chairs and business cards/current event posters. On April 23rd a youth cycling event is being held at noon at Goodwin School and helpers are needed to guide and instruct young cyclists. (Another email notice of this event will be emailed to the list.) On May 11th, Waldburger will conduct a workshop on bicycle commuting and safe riding in the Mansfield Community Center preceded by a no-drop ride starting at 5 PM. Gosselin said he would prepare a flyer for publicizing this event. June 17th is the Tour de Mansfield, at which Bike Mansfield again plans to have an information table at the start/finish. Another workshop and ride on Adventure Cycling/Bicycle Backpacking will be coordinated by Waldburger at the MCC on July 13th. The Thread City Cyclers Century ride will be held on July 29th, proceeds from which will be shared with Bike Mansfield, so helping to pass the word on this event will be very worthwhile! Finally, the Town of Mansfield’s Festival on the Square will be held on September 17th and Bike Mansfield will have a booth.

Some ideas for activities for booth activities at the September 17th festival were discussed, including a repeat of last-year’s photo contest. Santesiere said he might be able to have one of his high school students participate through a student project, and will explore this further prior to the May meeting.

Scheduled/possible activities during National Bike Month and National Bike Week were discussed. These included getting a Town Council proclamation, having a table-display on the Town Square on bike to work day (May 19th), possibly combined with bike to school day at the high school, or calling it a “bike to everywhere” day and celebrating it together. Some coordination with the Resident State Trooper would be required as well as coordination with the Community Center for the free use of showers for riders that day. The national “ride of silence” is scheduled for May 17th at 7 pm, which would also have to be coordinated as far as routing and any needed involvement of the police. Manizza, Hultgren and Santasiere said they would work on this.

Hultgren said that the Town’s Director of Planning had not yet reviewed the draft Town Bicycle/Pedestrian Master Plan and that he would follow up in the coming weeks with the Town staffers he had presented it to. He did note that the policy of opening up additional Town parks/open spaces to mountain biking had apparently hit a snag with the Town’s Parks Coordinator (via the CT Forest and Parks Association) and he and Hankins needed to follow up on this as well.

Yakovleff outlined two rides that were scheduled this spring with the scout troop from Ashford in Rhode Island (East Bay Bike Path) and Cape Cod (CCRT).

The meeting was adjourned at 7:29 pm. The next meeting is scheduled for May 4, 2017 (1st Thurs).

Lon Hultgren, Secretary-Treasurer
info@bikemansfield.com