8492-R1_MSA_September2023

Why it Helps to get your Grants in Early By Joe Higgins, Dept. of Agriculture Conservation and Forestry

Hello Fellow Snowmobilers, It’s been a very busy summer and I hope you all got a chance to get some much-needed rest from the snowmobile season we had last year. I also hope you got to spend time with your families. You all deserve it. Well, the summer is winding down with schools starting back up and nights a little cooler than a few weeks ago, which brings me to the fact that the snowmobile season is right around the corner and volunteers are already out working with landowners to make the connections we all have come accustomed to enjoying. Even though we may not have had a consistent snowpack across the state last season, there was great riding if you were willing to travel a little or be patient. The Maine snowmobile clubs worked hard to give us a great experience with the snow we did get, and they delivered some magnificent snowmobile trails. A big thank you to all that the snowmobile clubs for what they do to make all this happen. And thank you to the landowners who generously let us have snowmobile trails on their land. I would like to remind any club who is beginning to have workdays and start on trial work to keep in mind that a question I get often is: why we would want to get our grant applications in early. The biggest reason is that on both the Club Grant Application and the Municipal Grant Application we have an approval date that the office stamps on the application. If the club members go out and start their trail work prior to the Snowmobile Program approving the grant, then that work is not eligible for reimbursement. So please get your grant applications right back into us and you will save yourself and us a lot of time and headache. The approval date that is entered on your grant is the date that payables use as a beginning date of the agreement, so if a club sends in receipts, worksheets and groomer logs that are dated before that approval date it will not be eligible for reimbursement and won’t get funded. I do not want to have any kicked back, so be sure to get those appli cations in before trail work starts, and again it will relieve you and me from some unneeded aggravation. REMINDER: This year’s club and municipal grants now have the same application and reimbursement requests deadline dates. Club Grant and Municipal Grant applications are due December 1st each year and the Requests for Reimbursements are due April 30th of each year. This hopefully will make it easier for you to remember and give us time to process everything before the season starts in December and before year-end in June. All the snowmobile grant applications for your club and municipal projects have been mailed out. If you have not seen them or had a chance to put together your projects, please let us know and we’ll get the information right out to you. The Capital Equipment Grant Application are mailed out by request only, so will have to contact us to receive those. Same with the Disaster Relief Grant program, that too is by request only. Any questions on any of these, please call our office at 207-287-4957. Looking forward to a good snow season and hoping for lots of snow. The Capital Equipment grant program has been very successful in helping clubs update their equipment. This updated application and scoring process is helping clubs of all sizes and statewide update equipment. If you are considering purchasing a new groomer or drag, feel free to give me a call with any questions or concerns, I’d be happy to explain any part of our grant programs. If you are not aware, there is a scoring process in place for the Capital Equipment Grant that is part of these applications. You will want to read the application and scoring forms thoroughly. Some of the questions are worth more points than others and you will want to do everything you can to get the highest score. A new requirement for this next round of applications is you will want to have your trails inspected for signage. This question will be worth a lot of points on your application if your trail system is signed well. There will be State of Maine Snowmobile Program staff available or one of the Maine Snowmobile Trails inspec tors to help us get to your club’s trails and inspect them. A great time to talk with one of us and show off your trails. Have a safe and healthy rest of your summer and hope to see you at the Maine Snowmobile show in October. Joe Higgins Supervisor Off-Road Vehicle Program Dept. of Agriculture Conservation and Forestry (207) 287-4959 Fax (207) 287-8111

28

b e r 2

e m

0 2 3 l M a i n e S n o w m o b i l e r

p t

e

S