Winter, as you might imagine, is a busy time for the Road Crew in Spirit Lake East.

Weather tracking, planning, budget proposals + approvals and coordination are needed to lead the management of our roads.

As Road Chair / Superintendent of our 30 miles of roads—that’s 60 lane miles to be maintained— here in Spirit Lake East), I’m charged with running the roads program including all expenditures including critical equipment repairs year-around.

In winter, that includes coordinating with the Road Crew all staffing, plowing, sand purchases, trucking + distribution as well as communication with the HOA Board of Directors and community of 300+ homeowners (both proactive + reactive).

Residents need to know when plowing will be done or once it has been done and if there are conditions that we need to work through while the weather changes or when sand will be or has been distributed and where or why we need to wait.

There are so many aspects to this volunteer position and homeowner communication often can be the most complex.. Management and public speaking skills are also required to report on the roads and interact with the public at semi-annual meetings.

It’s no different than running commercial or residential build in collaborating with teams, subs, clients and investors, except there are more people to contend with in this position than I have ever needed to before even on the largest of builds I’ve run over the years!

But, winter is just the start of our busy season. Then, comes spring cleanup. To learn more about this phase, see Project Management page HERE.