I live and fly in Minden, in fact I moved to Minden for the soaring 8 years ago, so I'm partial to the idea of basing a national soaring center there.

Right now a small group of volunteers is trying to build a soaring center on the east side on land we have from the airport. Utilities will be going in this month or next, and we are trying to come up with a site plan. It is quite an ambitious, and exciting, prospect. Contact the Sports Aviation Foundation for details if you want more information. The Sports Aviation Foundation has 501(c)3 status and we are working slowly on building a fundraising base.

That said, I'm not sure 501(c)3 status is what is holding things up. As I said, the Sports Aviation Foundation already has that status, as does the Minden Soaring Club, which has given some 15 youth scholarships (worth $1000 in instructional costs) over the last 2 years alone.

There is some growth in our sport, but I'm not sure infrastructure is the real lack