What's New!
Canoe and Kayaking Event
The Friends of the Sauk River are actively planning
a canoe and kayaking event for next year.
Preliminary plans are to have a long and short route
between Rockville and St. Cloud. Thoughts for
logistics, food and entertainment are being
solicited.
Annual Membership Meeting
On September 12, 2009, the Friends of the Sauk River
held its forth annual membership meeting. The meeting
was held at the City Center Administration Building in
Melrose, MN. Approximately 10 members attended. During the meeting
several presentations were made. Bob Bjork gave a eulogy
of Haven Wiegers, one of the founders of the Friends
of the Sauk River. Mike Hayman presented a report on
the Upper Sauk River study and Tara Borgerding
presented her work on shoreline restoration on Lake
Osakis. Mike Hayman updated the membership on
projects involving our Healthy Lakes and Rivers
grant. Mitch Bender reported on the success of the
spring river cleanup. Dawn Hawkins lead a discussion
on planning a canoe/kayak event on the Sauk River.
Bob Bjork presented a review of the spring
brainstorming session. After the presentations, a
new board of directors was held, as well as officer
elections. A new officer position, membership
coordinator was created. At the conclusion of the
meeting, there was a drawing for door prizes and a
cookout at Sauk River Park.
Sauk River Earth Day Cleanup
The second annual Sauk River
Cleanup took place on May 2nd. This year's event was
even larger than the previous year. Over 80
volunteers pitched in to clean a 3 mile stretch of
the Sauk River. Several St. Cloud State University
students organized the event on behalf of the
Friends of the Sauk River. They were Blake Besser,
Sarah Erickson, Ryan Pantzke, and Jamison Reginek.
Mike Hayman, Friends of the Sauk River and SCSU
student also played a large role in planning the
event. Special gratitude and acknowledgement also
goes out to the cleanup sponsors: the SCSU Volunteer
Connection, the Sauk River Watershed District, City
of St. Cloud, City of Waite Park, Minnesota DNR -
Adopt a River, Frontier Liquor, Rumors Bar and
Grill, C&L Distributing Inc., Performance Polishing
Custom Metal Finishing, Coborn's, Gary Dotseth -
Wells Fargo Home Mortgage, Monster Drinks. And of
course, THANKS to all the great volunteers.
Branding of the Friends of
the Sauk River
One of the ideas from our March 28th visioning session
was to begin branding our group so that it will be more
widely recognized by the community. We will be starting
a I 'heart' the Sauk campaign, and we will also be
promoting sightings of the Sauk Ness Monster.
Visioning session
On March 28, 2009, the Friends of the Sauk River held a
visioning session to come up with a few creative new ideas for
Friends of the Sauk River projects.
We weren't disappointed. There dozens of
ideas generated and we'll be incorporating as many of
these ideas into the organization as quickly as we can.
