The 2nd Most Important Day of the Year

by Steve Panten

I think October is one of the best months for riding motorcycles in Wisconsin. The chill in the air and the trees changing colors make for a very enjoyable ride for me. Since we are talking about riding in October, make plans to attend ABATE’s annual meeting. There is so much happening during the weekend that affects the direction of ABATE for the next year, or two if you include who will be elected to the Board of Directors.

I firmly believe that our annual meeting is the second most important day of the year for motorcyclists in Wisconsin (after ABATE’s Lobby Day). During the Legislative Committee meeting on Sunday, we will determine our legislative agenda for the next year. Any member in good standing can attend the Legislative Committee and can be a member of it since there is no “set” committee, all you have to do is SHOW UP!

If you have never been a part of this, it is a very informal meeting where we bring up ideas that we should consider taking a position on. It might be a strong position where we try to draft a piece of legislation, or it can be a position where we need to meet with other group and bureaucrats. Everyone in attendance will have an opportunity to be part of the discussion and offer thoughts on what should be important to us in 2023. I have some ideas like; continue to figure out how to address the increased ethanol movement, and how to protect our fuel source. But there are other thoughts, like should the legislature allow communities to ban motorcycles on the ice but allow other vehicles?

Everyone in attendance has a voice and it is as strong as mine. You are the membership, and I get marching orders from you. I will do my best to lay the groundwork and find a strategy that may work, but then I need your help too. We are only as strong as our membership chooses to be. A small group of us can do the work to get the ball moving, but then we need help to be successful. This organization cannot be successful without all the members doing their part.

Speaking of ethanol and the Annual Meeting. At the meeting this year, the guest speaker will be someone from the American Petroleum Institute. John Reblin and I have been having meetings organized by them for like-minded organizations. There are ABATE members from many different states that are part of these meetings, and we discuss successes and setbacks that affect us. This has been a very frank discussion about what is going on and how important it is to stop the increase ethanol mandates to protect our engines. Yes, the members of API benefit greatly if we can slow down this movement but so do motorcyclists, so it is a great partnership.

At the last Board meeting we brought up that we were going to reach out to Kwik Trip (not a member of API, probably because they manufacture their own ethanol) to see if they are interested in doing a media campaign that would inform, air-cooled combustion engine users, that Kwik Trip will always have at least one pump (nozzle) at every location that will be E10 or less. We had one of the owners of Kwik Trip’s contact information from when we were opposing their bill, so we drafted an email asking for them to develop a media campaign directed to these vehicle owners but unfortunately, so far, we have not received a response. I guess I am not holding my breath, but we will keep trying. We will continue to use the members of the API meetings to help us push Kwik Trip for this.

October means that we are almost done with the pollical commercials. That means that we are running out of time to learn about the candidates that are running for elected seats in local, state and federal offices. The face of the Wisconsin government could look very different in January when the newly elected candidates take their office. It is important that every member did their homework and voted what is best for them. This is important for the ABATE elections too. Here is your chance to decide who you want to be part of the leadership team for this organization. It is important to remember that Board members work for you, just like politicians. Understand who is running and why. There is a write up for every candidate in the newsletter or come to the Annual Meeting and talk to them before you vote. Your last chance to vote is at the meeting in Shawano on October 9th.

Ok, so we read about the importance of the legislative committee meeting on October 9th. We read about elections, both in politics and in ABATE. Let’s go into motorcycle fatalities. Overall motorcycle fatalities are down about 30% over last year but we can do better. Labor Day weekend was not great for us. Last I saw, we lost 5 fellow motorcyclists, but that number may not be accurate until the “official” numbers come out. 5 lives are too many, but there is nothing that we can do about that right now, all we can do is take care of each other moving forward. PLEASE, watch out for each other. Take care of your brothers and sisters. Make sure they are riding within their means and consider taking an experienced rider class. Even long-time riders will admit that they learned things after completing the class.

That’s enough. Enjoy the great late fall riding, there are beautiful areas in this state and the changing colors make it even more amazing. I will see you at the Annual Meeting in Shawano on October 8th and 9th. I will be there and if you have something you want to talk to me about, there will be plenty of time for that.

That’s it.

Steve