The Friends of Pok-O-Moonshine

2/16/2013

Participants of the 2013 Patch Sprint are being asked, and encouraged, to make a small gift to the "Friends of Pok-O-Moonshine"- an organization dedicated to maintaining and preserving the trails and facilities on the Patch Sprint's final mountain.
"Nothing financially is required during registration," said one event official. "There is a check box on the registration form stating intent, and we will have a collection box at the event. Any little bit will help, as the main trail up Pok-O is in danger of being shut down."

   Sharp Swan, closely affiliated with Pok-O-MacCready Camps, and a member of the "Friends of Pok-O-Moonshine" writes:
   "I attended the Friends of Poke-Moonshine board meeting and it appears that New York State will allow the front trail (the rangers trail) to remain as long as some maintenance is done to the trail. If no interest is taken to bring the trail up to their standards they will close it off to the public.

   "The board has met with an ADK Professional Trail Crew representative and they think that it will cost at least $85,000 to fix the trail (maybe as high as $95,000), even with volunteers doing as much as they can possibly do. A professional crew cost approximately $5000 a week to place rock steps and harden the trail.

    "To show that the board is serious about this endeavor, they agreed to put money from their limited budget towards that end. This summer, if they can schedule the crew, they can fund two weeks, but that will pretty much deplete all of their funds that they currently have in the bank. Each year they hope, until the trail is done, to raise money to make the trail usable and show the state that we care about saving it. But it is a daunting task ahead."

As both camp, and the Patch Sprint have been using that trail since their inception, it is Swan's belief that "for both organizations it would extremely beneficial to help keep that trail open. I believe that it is something that we all should pitch in to help with. I don't think that it is entirely fair that someone else should raise all of the funds while we sit back and enjoy the fruits of their labor."