Have a Valdese Lakeside Park Workday in conjunction with the Draughn High School Interact Club (I am President), Rotary Club of Valdese (whom I have a connection with), Friends of the Valdese Rec (I am a Board Member), and the other volunteers. Other partner organizations could include Foothills Conservancy, Tri-M Honor Society, National Honor Society, and the Burke River Trail Association (I am a Board Member). The Workday scope will include general maintenance of the entrance and trail construction - a Lakeside Loop Trail which I am meeting with Amanda Smithson about on Wednesday. The week leading up to the workday, the trail will be excavated by a volunteer. The workday itself will last 3-6 hours, but there will be many other workdays on both sides of this main one.

Yesterday, Feburary 24th, the North Carolina Land and Water Fund approved our request to build the Lakeside Loop Trail. In January, I assisted in flagging a rough trail corridor, and I finalized the trail layout with pin flagging. In addition to that, I helped install a storybook trail along the Meditation Point Trail, where the Lake Loop will stem off of. The goal of the Lake Loop is to create a core space at Valdese Lakeside Park for kids and beginner hikers, and with the storybook trail, the existing Meditation Point trail and overlook, the Lake Loop, and the potential for exercise stations on the Lake Loop, I think it will do just that. As the trail is now approved, we are on target for the March workday I discussed in December. The exact date is March 18th. I am currently reaching out to Interact, Foothills, Mountains to Sea Trail, Friends of the Valdese Rec, and our local Boy Scout Troup to find as many volunteers as possible. FVR and I already have the necessary hand tools to build the trail, and we are renting an excavator for just below $1000 to grade the trail starting on the Monday before the workday. Before the excavator comes, the trail corridor will need to be cleared, which will be done in either a mini-workday or just by myself and a few other FVR members. I have attached a photo of the scope of the project, where the red highlighted is the trail alignment, from my JSON editor. Update: As of 3/8, I along with a few others have cleared a substantial part of the corridor for the trail. This took place over the past three mornings. Due to rain, the excavator is now coming earlier - tomorrow. I will be with the excavator 8 hours a day, whether clearing the corridor or assisting directly on foot. There will be a workday with the Department of Adult Correction, Officer Training Class on Monday to assist with trail-building and the finishing part of clearing the corridor. Update: As of 3/16, the excavation has finished. Some of this time has been recorded in project planning.

I am distributing this project a variety of places. Firstly, on Facebook, with the event currently having 7 people going and 18 interested. We are still 10 days out from the event. I've also contacted the local VLP hiking group and a larger, Burke County hiking group, as well as issued an article to our two local newspapers. I also reached out to Doug Veasey with the Mountains to Sea Trail Volunteer Crew, and the local Boy Scout Troop. Interact Club, which I am President of, is also planning to help, along with some members of the Rotary Club.

The official workday was a success. We had at least 41 people work for 4 hours, on top of the workday we had last Saturday. We had Boy Scouts, Mountains to Sea Trail Volunteers, NCSSM Students, DHS Interact Students, and general community members.

This project started in December with trail flagging done by NC State Parks and me pin flagging it. We waited for NC Land and Water Fund Approval for two months and then started clearing the corridor, excavating, and building it this month. We cleared the corridor in early March, and from March 9th-16th, excavated it. I put in 60 hours in that 7 day period, the excavator operator with 60 hours, and another 5 volunteers, totaling close to 200 hours. Combining that with the 160 hours put in today by our 41 volunteers, and the original corridor clearing, and in kind work by State Parks, this project has had 400 hours invested into it. It will make a great Lakeside Loop for all ages to enjoy. I am looking into the option of adding interactive exhibits like animal prints, educational signage, etc, which could be a future Scout project.