Will Tri-Citians Risk Riding to South Dakota for an OPEN Sturgis?
By a Sturgis city council vote of 8-1, the motorcycle rally is to take place August 7th-August 16th in South Dakota. So, will you go?
I have many friends who love rolling on two, wheels that is, and the highlight of their year is the annual roadie to Sturgis to catch the crazies and festivities around said crazies. Plus this year it's the 80th Anniversary, so yeah, it's a big deal to keep the streak alive.
The feeling around the shop at Rattlesnake Mountain Harley Davidson at 19th and 395 in Kennewick is one of, big surprise, uncertainty, as in not too sure if anyone on staff will make the trek and today was relatively slow on interest. But the decision to even have the rally at all was made just late last night, plus it's still a ways away...like August. That's forever in COVID-19 timing, brother!
City officials in Sturgis say that the Rally will be scaled down and that the main focus is keep residents and visitors safe.
“There’s not going to be a lot of the public activities that there usually are so including the opening ceremonies, the B1 flyover, different contests and activities and parades and things that we usually do during the Rally we would not be doing that because that really does encourage and if you see any of the photographs there tends to be thousands of people lined on the Main Street,” said Dan Ainslie, the Sturgis City Manager. “We’re trying to avoid that.”
Sanitary measures will be ramped up which will include hand sanitizing stations throughout the city and disinfecting sidewalks every night.
If conditions change over the next seven weeks, the mayor has the right to make necessary adjustments up to and including the cancellation of the Rally entirely.