We’ve come a long way from early discussions about how to build an ice rink for the Seeley-Swan community to enjoy. We knew a few things that we wanted: free access, free skates, a safe environment, and easy community access/parking. The rest of our plans unfolded – and continue to unfold – over time. For the free access, we depend upon community support through the Community Foundation Change Your Pace program as well as from the Community Foundation Community Grant program. We have also received generous support from the Missoula County Parks, Trails and Open Lands grant funds. For free skates, we tap a variety of sources, from Glacier Ice Rink in Missoula to private donations from community members. For the land, we work with the Seeley Lake Elementary School Board and convert a baseball infield into the rink for the winter; this ensures a steady flow of skaters from the school for outdoor physical education.

 

Over time, we have been able to purchase a shed to organize and house the skates, benches for skaters to use to change into the skates, and we recently added electricity to the shed so that we can light the shed and use our electric skate sharpener to renew the older blades. To enhance the safe environment around the school, we added lighting to the rink area so that those short days/long nights could extend to longer skating time for both the school children but also for the wider adult community who also love to (or want to try to) skate. Given that the school is in the center of town, many of our users can walk to the rink and those who drive can park safely on the school grounds while they enjoy their brisk outdoor exercise.

 

Over time, our rink project has grown from us putting up boards and figuring out how to flood the ice to managing a fully functional outdoor recreational area with lighting, skates, changing shed, snowblowers to clear the ice (something we used to do by hand with shovels), 80+ pairs of free skates, enlarged rink size to 65 ft. by 160 ft., NHL hockey nets, learn-to-skate support devices and more.

 

Our broader future goals will require more volunteers and financial support if we grow the rink beyond its current status. Improved maintenance equipment would enable better ice conditions and a covered rink would be ideal for our snowy environment, but the next growth phase would be expensive, so we are mostly focused on making this current rink as accessible and free and fun for as many people as we can during our long, beautiful, cold winters here in Seeley Lake.