Community Effort Helps To Make Tour de Nebraska A Success

Through rain and cold weather, the community of Neligh came together and welcomed hundreds of bikers into the town during the 2018 Tour de Nebraska last week.

This year’s Tour de Nebraska made multiple stops over it’s course, including Neligh, O’Neill & Niobrara.

Dana Klabenes, the City Clerk for the City of Neligh, said that they received word last year that Tour de Nebraska was interested in Neligh.

“We have been planning this for a little over a year when we first heard that Tour de Nebraska was coming through town,” Klabenes said.

She said that the planning started with a committee of herself and the Economic Development office.

“We started out with a committee of the economic development office- Gabe Steinmeyer and Lauren Sheridan-Simonsen - and myself, and then when the two summer interns came, they joined us as well,” she said.

Simonsen said that the planning stages started with a plug-in list that Tour de Nebraska sets up for host communities.

“They give you a book from the beginning that tells you how to plan, and you fill in all the blanks,” Simonsen said.

Their guidelines for setting up the event were helpful. According to Simonsen, neither her nor Steinmeyer had prior experience with setting up a Tour de Nebraska event.

“Gabe and I were both new to this. Dana had done it about seven years ago,” Simonsen said.

Wednesday saw a day full of rain across the area, putting a damper on the plans for the event. Klabenes said they originally planned on everything taking place in the park.

“At first, everything was planned to be outdoors, with nice weather, so everyone was going to camp in Riverside Park with breakfast being served in the Pavillion. We were going to have a concert at the Grandstands in the park and a scavenger hunt throughout town, with other activities and dinners going on in the evening,” she said.

Although they had to rush to accommodate for the weather, Steinmeyer said that the school had always been plan-B

“We always had the school as a rain site. We knew that would be our rain site from the beginning,” Steinmeyer said.

Having the school as a place away from the park for the bikers to stay dry helped to keep spirits high. However, transporting them to and from the school was a challenge in the beginning.

“The main issue for us was the shuttles and getting people places they needed to go without getting too wet. Luckily, the school (Neligh-Oakdale) was very generous, and we had a bus driver with a bus to shuttle people from the park up to the school and back.”

Big Red Motorsports, Klabenes said, was also key in helping transport supplies and travelers around town.

“Big Red Motorsports helped us with the ATV/UTV’s to shuttle things back and forth. The grocery store was very helpful in getting a lot of supplies ready to go for the breakfast and throughout the day,” Klabenes said.

The U.S. Air Force Heartland of America band Raptor provided entertainment for the community and the riders during their performance at the Neligh-Oakdale gym on Wednesday night. Steinmeyer said that having a band like them return to the area again was something they strived for.

“Last year we had a great turn out with the military band when they played at the ag building, and we knew that that would be an overwhelming thing that people would want to have come back to the community,” Steinmeyer said.

With 500 riders coming through into the community, needs had to be met. The riders would want a place to have a warm cup of coffee, restaurant choices, and places to stock up on supplies. With the rain came another need, dry clothing.

According to Simonsen, almost all of the restaurants and retail businesses in the community were busy with riders.

“The Imperial was slammed, Sly’s was slammed, they were full. A lot of the retail places in town had big days as well because of the rain. Bomgaars, Pitzer Digital, Dollar General. Riders coming in and buying clothing because of the rain.”

The community as a whole was key in making the whole operation work. Members of the community welcomed the riders with open arms, and several families opened up their homes to the riders for a place to stay. Certain community members, including Donna Keetle and Lloyd Meis, were crucial in the transition away from the park, according to Steinmeyer.

The warm reception, Steinmeyer said, helped showcase what kind of community Neligh is.

“Neligh itself is a very open community, and people are always willing to step up and help out and show what a great community Neligh is, and I think this is a shining example of that. We had a number of people who volunteered to host some riders, and we are very grateful and thankful to the different families that opened their homes for the riders. That was huge,” Steinmeyer said.

Overall, the community came together and stepped up, even with the rain, to welcome the bikers and to make sure their needs were met. Simonsen said that the effort by all goes to show the strength and determination of the community.

“That just goes to show you the resilience of Neligh, and how, ‘this is what we are given, let’s go make lemonade.’”

​