Hello again, Colorado Spokesman readers. This is Part Six in a series of articles on the history of ABATE’s Rider Ed division. Part Five began with 2004 and ended with 2005.It’s now February, 2006; we are going to train this year at the same 10 sites we used last year:
1. FRCC, Fort Collins  Marsha Hall
2. Aims CC, Greeley  Bob Liepold
3. FRCC, Westminster  Shirley Angel
4. RRCC, Lakewood  Larry Ranburger
5. ACC, Littleton  David Dress
8. Post Time Dog Track, Colorado Springs  Scott Staeben
9. Colorado State University, Pueblo  Charlie Gerlt
10. Summit High School  Gary Greenwood

We also intend to expand our Mobile Program so we can bring the training to more remote areas of Colorado. Negotiations have gone well at Morgan Community College in Fort Morgan, and at the airport in La Junta. It looks like we will be able to present training in Fort Morgan this spring; Bruce Downs will be administering the program there. We hope to move the Mobile Program trailer and bikes from Fort Morgan to Summit County for the summer months and then to La Junta in the fall. We are also looking into the possibility of presenting Experienced Rider Courses on the Western Slope, in the vicinity of Grand Junction.

We have hired a new staff member for the office; her name is Pat Nowlin. Our staff is:
State Operations Manager: Terry Howard
Director of Rider Education: Ben Hochberg
Operations Manager: Perrie Ranburger
Office Manager: Deb Craig
Office Assistant: Pat Nowlin

ABATE of Colorado has been working with the Colorado Department of Transportation in order to affect some badly needed changes to the M.O.S.T. Program. We appear to be making progress on getting the outdated set of Rules revised; and we are contributing to the efforts to re-establish the M.O.S.T. Advisory Committee. We have had less success with getting CDOT to cooperate in approving a second set of curricula for possible use in the Program. The M.O.S.T. Rules say that other curricula may be evaluated for use, however, the Colorado Attorney General has advised CDOT to hesitate on this, based on the threat from the Motorcycle Safety Foundation (the provider of the already-accepted curricula) to sue any program, individual, entity, etc., which chooses to use this particular alternative. ABATE has issued a statement about this; it can be found on our website (www.abateofcolo.org). Efforts to get CDOT to comply with it’s own rules continue.

That’s it for Part Six. Keep your head and eyes up when riding, and watch out for that nasty black ice!