trail clearing technique and tools

[2manyrocks]

You may feel differently about the situation when you feel better.

$4,000 to do what you and your wife think is fun. I suppose you could spend $4,000 a year going on cruises that you might not enjoy as much as your trail work. What else would you want to do if you weren't doing this trail work? How else would you invest or spend this $4,000?

In any small organization, a few people usually do the majority of the work. Outside of TBN members, it's hard to find people that enjoy hard work.

Parking on the road might be solved by having a few cars towed. Word gets around.

My experience with grants is you have to write in their lingo and place your organization squarely within the grant maker's criteria for giving out money. It's a matter of finding a way to show to them that you fit in their mold. You might need to set up a 501c3 organization for the money to flow.

 

[ArlyA]

You may feel differently about the situation when you feel better.

$4,000 to do what you and your wife think is fun. I suppose you could spend $4,000 a year going on cruises that you might not enjoy as much as your trail work. What else would you want to do if you weren't doing this trail work? How else would you invest or spend this $4,000?

In any small organization, a few people usually do the majority of the work. Outside of TBN members, it's hard to find people that enjoy hard work.

Parking on the road might be solved by having a few cars towed. Word gets around.

My experience with grants is you have to write in their lingo and place your organization squarely within the grant maker's criteria for giving out money. It's a matter of finding a way to show to them that you fit in their mold. You might need to set up a 501c3 organization for the money to flow.

We applied for the grant with a 501c3. All machines to operate these trails cost us around $50,000 not 4K. The 6x6 alone was about 30k. My spouse has written and won grants before and knows you need to match their needs.

 

[kenmbz]

Maybe check in with activity groups like cross country ski, mountain biking etc. if you haven't yet.

 

[ArlyA]

Maybe check in with activity groups like cross country ski, mountain biking etc. if you haven't yet.

We applied with a multifaceted philanthropic organization the gives to silent sports agendas here that supports public use. They give away multi millions per year. We will apply with them again this summer but if we get no $$$, we'll start to wonder what we are doing.

 

[airbiscuit]

• Whose property is it?
• What work/materials are needed for making a parking area?
• If it is mostly machine work, perhaps the township would do some of that.
• Maybe local local excavation companies would be willing to donate some equipment time or gravel (especially if they were recognized with a sponsor sign).
• If the parking area is cleared and leveled, does it even need gravel (frozen during the winter)?

 

[dodge man]

I never wrote for grants but in the engineering world we did a lot of them. Sometimes money will get thrown at you, like a water system that needs upgraded, it’s a health issue. Another is a low income area or town. A third is to show revenue. You have an activity that will cost the tax payers money but it fills up hotels, bed and breakfasts, restaurants so there is some payback. Another would be environmental concerns, you will help protect the environment, like a sewage plant.

It’s also important to identify “free money” sources. You can’t get it if you don’t know about it. I’m not sure if you qualify for any of those or not. You and your wife seem like pretty smart people and have probably thought this through. Sometimes the answer is always no.

 

[ArlyA]

• Whose property is it?
• What work/materials are needed for making a parking area?
• If it is mostly machine work, perhaps the township would do some of that.
• Maybe local local excavation companies would be willing to donate some equipment time or gravel (especially if they were recognized with a sponsor sign).
• If the parking area is cleared and leveled, does it even need gravel (frozen during the winter)?

Privet property who sold its public recreation use.
Trees and stumps need to be removed and all nomaly things to gravel a road base.
Township doesn't have enough money to keep there roads up.
Its was bid out and all bids came in about 10,000. In order to ask for any grant, you have to get bids.
We are going to follow codes so it needs to have ditch for drianage and gravled.

 

[John_Mc]

Most of the grants I've seen for this sort of work go toward properties which guarantee public access. They are not going to pour thousands of dollars into private property when the owner has the right to change their mind and decide.

There were a couple of suggestions here that are worth considering. One was to set up a 501c3. ArlyA, you seem to have misinterpreted that as applying to a 501c3 for funds. Setting up your own means that people could contribute to it and get a tax deduction for it (though that has become Of course, there is always the chance that when you try to set up a 501c3 the IRS will challenge that status if the 501c3 is set up simply to make improvements on private property.

You mentioned that you had "applied with a multifaceted philanthropic organization the gives to silent sports agendas here that supports public use." I suspect that what @kenmbz was suggesting is that you make contact directly with those groups. There are two things that could come of this:

1. Many of these groups' members provide volunteer labor to assist with trail maintenance and grooming in exchange for the use of a landowner's property. ("Fellowship of the Wheel" is a mountain biking group that does this sort of thing in our area.) The better groups also police their own members to prevent abuse: they don't want to risk being kicked off the property because a few bad eggs abused the privilege.
2. The other possibility is that you could try applying jointly with those groups for grants for trail maintenance and grooming. Since they are established groups with a track record in the area, a joint application may look better to the grantor. It also confirms to the grantor that others are benefitting from the funds beyond just the landowner.

A couple of other thoughts on grants: a grantor is far less likely to fund something like the purchase of a mower plow, grooming attachment (or ATV or tractor) that will be owned by a private individual. They might be more likely to consider funding something owned by one of those activity groups. It's possible that grants might be available to help fund one of these groups to hire someone to groom their trails. However, I'd bet that hiring a landowner to maintain trails on their own property might raise a few eyebrows (it looks too much like a private individual benefiting from the funding).

 

[ArlyA]

Most of the grants I've seen for this sort of work go toward properties which guarantee public access. They are not going to pour thousands of dollars into private property when the owner has the right to change their mind and decide.

There were a couple of suggestions here that are worth considering. One was to set up a 501c3. ArlyA, you seem to have misinterpreted that as applying to a 501c3 for funds. Setting up your own means that people could contribute to it and get a tax deduction for it (though that has become Of course, there is always the chance that when you try to set up a 501c3 the IRS will challenge that status if the 501c3 is set up simply to make improvements on private property.

You mentioned that you had "applied with a multifaceted philanthropic organization the gives to silent sports agendas here that supports public use." I suspect that what @kenmbz was suggesting is that you make contact directly with those groups. There are two things that could come of this:

1. Many of these groups' members provide volunteer labor to assist with trail maintenance and grooming in exchange for the use of a landowner's property. ("Fellowship of the Wheel" is a mountain biking group that does this sort of thing in our area.) The better groups also police their own members to prevent abuse: they don't want to risk being kicked off the property because a few bad eggs abused the privilege.
2. The other possibility is that you could try applying jointly with those groups for grants for trail maintenance and grooming. Since they are established groups with a track record in the area, a joint application may look better to the grantor. It also confirms to the grantor that others are benefitting from the funds beyond just the landowner.

A couple of other thoughts on grants: a grantor is far less likely to fund something like the purchase of a mower plow, grooming attachment (or ATV or tractor) that will be owned by a private individual. They might be more likely to consider funding something owned by one of those activity groups. It's possible that grants might be available to help fund one of these groups to hire someone to groom their trails. However, I'd bet that hiring a landowner to maintain trails on their own property might raise a few eyebrows (it looks too much like a private individual benefiting from the funding).

This is privet property who sold its public recreation use.

 

[John_Mc]

This is privet property who sold its public recreation use.

If it's still private property (and not owned by a non-profit or similar organization) that makes grants more difficult. Even if the landowner says "I let the public on" grantors know that that permission can be with drawn at any moment. An agreement with some recreation group can bump your project up in the rankings. - even more so if the group applies with you.