The question should be why join a snowclub?
The answer....why not?
I live in Maine, and am the treasurer of my local club the Saco Pathfinder's. I have been riding for over 20 years although not every single season. The weather does not favor Southern Maine along the coast.
I travel 3-4 hours north to ride on some of the nicest trails in New England. These trails are public owned and if not for the Maine Snowmobile Association (MSA) might not exsist.
Your state snowmobile associations were formed for you by people just like you and me, snowmobilers.
We need to support our state and local clubs so that we can all ride. The MSA has alot of members and this was reflected last year when members of the MSA got our elected officials to put 3 million dollars on a transpotation bond to build recreational lanes on some new bridges up north. This passed and next year a few water crossings will get a lot less hazardous. Then they got a $5.00 fee added to all registrations for the funding of new trail grooming equipment with 100% of that fee going directly to local clubs.
Could an association with 1000 members do that?
There are 90,000 snowmobiles registered in Maine and 10,000 MSA members. With the upcoming problems of noise, pollution,enviromental concerns and safety issues that my state and probably yours is going to go through, then it only makes sense to join a club, support the club, and support your state association.
The future of our children getting the same oppurtunities to ride as we do today or even having it better than we have it rests in our hands (or wallets). The $20-30 bucks for a membership doesn't seem so bad when you consider the benefit we get from it.......over 200,000 miles of trails in the U.S. alone!