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 Bikers rumbling in to Ignacio
9/3/2010 By: Melanie Brubaker Mazur
Hundreds of volunteers prepare for Bike Week
So what does it take to prepare for a weekend-long party with 25,000+ visitors?
Lots and lots of help, and it’s all unpaid.
Ignacio Bike Week wouldn’t exist without the volunteers who help pull it all together, said Emily Meisner, the president of the Ignacio Chamber of Commerce and chair of the Ignacio Bike Week committee, which is a subcommittee of the chamber.
On Wednesday, they were busy in Ignacio, raising tents, checking in vendors, and preparing for yesterday’s opening of Ignacio Bike Week. The fifth annual rally hosted by the chamber ends Sunday.
Many of this year’s volunteers hearken back to the days of the Four Corners Motorcycle Rally, which started in Ignacio 17 years ago. Other entities came and went until the chamber started running the rally on short notice in 2005. That’s when a rally organizer pulled up stakes in May, leaving Ignacio businesses knowing that bikers were coming, and there wouldn’t be anything for the visitors to do unless Ignacio folks decided to organize it themselves.
Five years later, rally organization runs fairly smoothly. There was the year some of the bulls got loose from the biker bullriding pen. There are a few incidents which require the police every year, but for that many people coming into town, it’s pretty mellow, local law officials say.
But it takes a lot of manpower to keep everything running smoothly.
“I do anything they want me to, pretty much,” said Lou Hendren, who was helping set up the beer tent on Wednesday.
Sam Maez works on the security committee. The rally hires Taylor Security for the event, but he makes sure it all works the way it is supposed to.
It’s a lot of work, Maez said, but there are benefits, too.
“You get backstage passes,” he said. “I have free access everywhere. And the volunteer dinners and parties are good.”
Just meeting all of the people who come to the area is another benefit, as well.
Cecilia Robbins, a trustee on the Ignacio Town Board, was checking in some of the 70-plus vendors on Wednesday. She’s volunteered for the rally for years.
“The money that it brings into Ignacio is important,” she said. “People have begun buying vacation homes here. And Ignacio gets put on the map. It’s not just that little place by Durango.”
Some Ignacio volunteers wish more of their work was acknowledged by the businesses and organizations in Durango that benefit from the influx of visitors, but don’t want to help sponsor or support the event. They do appreciate the businesses that support the rally, however. If it weren’t for the donations or price breaks on goods and materials, they couldn’t pull it off.
For Mike Gould, volunteering at the rally is important because the tips at the beer tent support Blue Star Moms, a group that supports the families of military personnel.
“It’s for the right cause,” he said.
Meisner said other key volunteers include Jerry Smiley, an electrician who donates his time to keep the power running to the vendors, and Terry Cartwright of the Christian Motorcycle Association. They both donate well over a week of their time every year to keep the rally going.
The chamber itself has dozens of volunteers manning the beer tent. Proceeds from that event fund most of the chamber’s events and donations for the upcoming year. Mike Pacheco, owner of Paco Glass, staffs the beer tents for 12 hours a day, making sure the volunteers are checking IDs and everything runs smoothly.
If rallygoers can thank a volunteer this weekend, that’s s a big boost for a job that doesn’t pay anything, but has a lot of rewards, Meisner said.
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