KAMO – February, 2022 Newsletter
For comments related to this document, contact Mike

President?s remarks – Hello to all KAMO members and friends,
This is Kids And Mentors Outdoors, President Mark Walters with my monthly report. For the first time in a long time there is plenty of good news. I attended a regrouping meeting for The Yellow River Chapter of KAMO and I honestly believe that this chapter is going to get on the right track. I will also attend their March 16th meeting.
With three other members of The Meadow Valley Chapter I attended a kids fisheree as a volunteer and holy moly was I impressed. On March 23rd our Board of Directors will be holding a teleconference. If you have any thoughts or ideas please send them to Bob as he is putting our agenda together.
On April 5th I will be speaking at a Whitetails Unlimited banquet in Beaver dam and I really think that will help The Dodge County Chapter of KAMO. Jim Braker and his crew are really getting a lot accomplished and the crowd of 260 should spread the word pretty good in Dodge County.
I think that KAMO is beginning to hit the stride it was in right before Covid hit and I really appreciate everyone’s hard work and enthusiasm.
As always, thank you for all that you do for KAMO!

Mark

This is the time of year when we hear from people about what we are doing.. Are you ready for that?
Gmail accounts/ Forms – Several chapters opened Gmail accounts and were sent forms. Before using the mentor or kid profile forms, make a copy of each profile form (2, mentor and kid) you saved to your drive. Don’t copy the link. Copy the form. OPen the form, go to ?file?, ?make a copy?,rename the copy. Get rid of the original forms you were sent. Now you are ready to send the link to the new form to your mentors or families and it will work seamlessly. If you don’t make a copy and send someone a link to the form you were sent, the submitted material will end up in Coulee’s spreadsheet. If you have any questions about this, contact Scott Linssen at 608-406-6123 or Mike at 608-799-5037 in the evening.
The contents in your Google account should include:
Kid and Mentor Profile Forms – your chapter?s copy KAMO Bylaws and policies
Certificate of tax exempt (tax exempt number is also on directory front page)
Certificate of insurance High resolution logos KAMO directory
Raffle license for the year Thank you letter blanks with logo in header
KAMO Directory – Is your section of the directory up to date? Have you reported the names and contact info for new mentors to Mike? If not, those people slip through the cracks and are not listed in our directory and are not placed on our group mailing list. Has anyone left your group, but haven’t been removed from the group mailing list?
Logo – There is a compass logo with an orange ribbon on the bottom with the ?Tradition Forward? motto. If you know the location of an electronic copy of it,please let Mike know. We would like that particular version of the logo for some poster design.This is the logo on our brochure, yet I (Mike) can?t find a quality copy of it.

Board of Directors Meeting – Teleconference – If you are a Boardof Director member, please plan on joining the KAMO BOD teleconference on Wednesday March 23rd at 7:00 pm. I will send out the teleconference call info and an agenda as we get closer to the meeting date. If you have topics which you want to add to the agenda, please forward them to me (Bob Nicksic)
The Agenda thus far is :
KAMO Annual Meeting (in person)?
President vacancy
Chapter dues
Mike Brown would like someone from another chapter working with him on some minor projects.

Hunter Ed – The online only option for minors ends at midnight on March 20th, 2022. This creates an immediate demand for hunter ed classes in your community.
This from the DNR –
The Midwest Outdoor Heritage Education Expo – MOHEE event is on for this year! It is being held at the Mackenzie Center in Poynette. The dates are Wednesday May 18th and Thursday May 19th.
We cannot do this without your help! We need 25-30 volunteers each day to make this happen. We will be mentoring school students shooting BB guns ? in the past we have had thousands of students come through in the 2 days.
Lunch, soft drinks, and water will be provided for volunteers each day.
If you volunteer both days and are traveling an hour and ½ or more, a double occupancy motel room will be provided if requested at a hotel in Lodi.
If you know someone who is not a hunter education instructor who would like to volunteer and you can vouch for that person, please ask them to volunteer. We would need the name, address, phone number, and e-mail address of that person.
We need to know if you are volunteering one day or both days. If you are volunteering one day, please let us know which one.
Parking will be in the upper parking lots and shuttle buses will be used to get volunteers around.
Please contact me if you want to volunteer, if you can recruit some new volunteers, that would be great. Arrival time for volunteers is 8AM both days to set up and be ready to go. The buses start arriving about 9AM.
If you need a hotel, please let me know ASAP! Please let me know if you have any questions!
Kim Cooley – 608-575-3615/ kimberly.cooley@wisconsin.gov

Chapter Reports

Baraboo – Did not meet in February

Coulee – We did not meet or have outings in February. We did send out an email to parents informing them we are still around and will meet in March to line up some activities they will be invited to. Those activities should include archery, fishing outings, rod and gun club, Saturday offerings at Norskedalen. Members of our KAMOKID group have been invited to attend a spring hunter ed class and some are attending.

Dodge County Conservation – Dodge County Conservation KAMO attended Grandpa Rays outdoor seminar along with Aaron and his wife from Meadow Valley Chapter. Greg Pahl from DCC gave a short speech on KAMO and what it’s all about. Funds raised from the Raffles at the event were given to DCC Kamo. Also DCC is holding its first Raffle and tickets are selling rapidly . For information Contact Jim Braker (920)210-6998 or any other member of DCC KAMO. Coming up is Art on the town event on March 27th. Kids will be able to make something for their Moms for mothers day. Will also be meeting with Dodge County Chapter of Pheasants Forever to discuss further how Our Chapters can work together to get kids involved in outdoors activities .

Meadow Valley – Due to a variety of reasons, we only had 3 members present at our February meeting. With that being said, we had 2 guests attend. One guest is a potential new mentor and the other is the coach of the recently organized New Lisbon Fishing Club.
Julie Mecikalski (teacher at the New Lisbon Schools) has organized a
fishing club to participate in the Wisconsin Interscholastic Fishing Association (WIFA). Our KAMO Chapter has agreed to work with /co-sponsor this club. The fishing club plans on doing at least 2 activities a month dealing with either fund raising or fishing related activities. Aaron took a group of club members to the fishing expo in Madison to browse the various displays and listen to the fishing seminars. Additionally, the Meadow Valley Chapter donated $500 to
assist in helping the club get started.
We had 3 members participate in the Outdoors forever youth fisheree. A well organized event that hosted over a 100 youth with each youth receiving a rod and reel and fishing baits for participating. From this event, we believe we may have recruited 3 new kids into KAMO.
Our next KAMO activity will be a Maple Syrup Day.

Bob
Northwoods – Hello from Northeast chapter,
We had our ice fishing outing on Feb 19th, I believe it’s the most attended we ever had with over 20 kids showing up from both Wi and Mi.. There were plenty of first time ice fisher kids and we had a great day and ice putt putt golf was also enjoyed.
KAMO will be running the 50/50 raffles for the Uphill truck drags on March 12th at Keyes Peak Ski Hill for a donation of $500.. There are trucks coming from 5 states for the event!!!
Fundraising has been going well with $600 donated in February from our local logging community.
Our chapter seems to be building a little momentum with several parents interested in becoming mentors or volunteers.
I hope to potentially involve KAMO on a syrup making event I do every year, pending weather and timing.
Keep doing good things everyone! Spring is on way soon,
Johnny Johnson from Florence Wisconsin….

Yellow River – ?After a too-long Covid induced hiatus from holding regular meetings the Yellow River chapter met on February 16th with a renewed commitment to re-establish our presence in the community and area through reaching out to reconnect with our current partnering organizations and recruiting new mentors. No organized activities have been planned at this time but we intend to hold another brat fry fundraiser this summer to raise funds and help with name recognition/purpose?.

Keith Merkel
Secretary/Treasurer – Yellow River chapter