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RANGE EVENT COMPLEX 
Late last fall, the Tribal Council asked FWRC Division
staffers Tom McDonald and Lester Bigcrane to help shepherd the
planning effort with Lake County, the City of Ronan and the
Tribes for the newly acquired Tribal and County lands in Ronan.
The county and the city jointly purchased 31 acres west of town
and the tribes acquired the adjacent 31 acres with the intent by
all parties to jointly plan for various community needs. A few
items on the needs list are to move the current Ronan fair uses
and community center/county extension offices to the site, along
with constructing a recreation facility similar to the Arlee
Recreation Center the Tribes built two years ago for the Arlee
community.
The first item worked on by our NRD staff was to officially
organize the previous ad hoc planning group into a formal
committee with an inter-local agreement between the city, tribes
and county. Secondly, an architecture site planning team was
brought in from Montana State University to help facilitate
conceptual site/building plan alternatives. Various community
need surveys were developed and completed by the group. The
staff then participated and helped facilitate monthly planning
group meetings and Ronan Tribal Council District meetings.
Based on the most frequent responses for needed activities
identified from the tribal member, area high schools, and the
general community surveys, the Tribal Council is supporting
those related developments at the 62 acre site. More
specifically for the 31 acres of Tribal land, the Tribal Council
want to see what the conceptual plans will look like if it
contains the following items:
- Indoor swimming facilities with a competition pool,
therapy pool, water slide and kiddy pool.
- Indoor recreation facility similar but larger than
Arlee’s with basketball courts and fitness/weight exercise
rooms
- Indoor ice skating rink/roller rink.
- Indoor laser tag facility.
- Outdoor areas and fields for multi purpose activities
such as baseball, soccer, native games, basketball and
powwow arbor.
- Kids fishing pond.
The planning committee is also looking at developing a 9,000
person maximum capacity multi purpose indoor arena, a 47,000 sq.
ft. exhibition and extension building, 37,000 sq. ft. of horse
and beef barns, and 28,000 sq. ft. of multi purpose building
space for small animals and show rooms. Additional space will be
identified for a midway and carnival set up and an outdoor warm
up arena for rodeos and horse shows.
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