April 13, 2002 - The Rapid City Journal Online.

Group plans to create retreat center for people with disabilities

By Steve Miller, West River Editor

KEYSTONE -- A group headed by Ski for Light co-founder Dallas Dietrich plans to restore an old mining site outside Keystone and transform it into a retreat center for people with handicaps and their families.

The group, called Meeting the Need, also plans to collect and provide adaptive equipment for people who can’t afford it.

Dietrich said the project is motivated by the need for lodging for people with disabilities during the tourist season, by the need for special equipment for people with disabilities, and by his own experiences. Dietrich, injured in a 1997 auto accident, uses a wheelchair.

He and his wife, Mary Dietrich, who own tourist businesses in Keystone, notice many tourists in wheelchairs. Once, a wheelchair basketball team from Utah visited Keystone and didn’t have a place to stay, Dietrich said. Dietrich says any lodging, let alone handicapped-accessible lodging, is hard to find during the busy tourist season.

He wants to create a retreat center on 102 acres that he and Mary own at the old mining site of Otho, east of Keystone.

Dietrich wants to restore the existing buildings, including a bunkhouse, a cookhouse, a supervisor’s cabin and an office. “We want to make sure they are restored to the period, but we also want to make sure they are handicapped-accessible,” he said.

The group also hopes to build a lodge on the property.

Both the lodge and the restored old buildings would provide lodging for disabled people and their families visiting the Hills. Dietrich wants to be able to accommodate gatherings ranging from a couple to groups of 20.

Dietrich also hopes to have rehabilitation equipment on site so patients could come out to “rehab in the fresh air.”

But, he said, the organization would be more than a resort or retreat destination. It could also do such things as take a disabled person to Mount Rushmore or provide a getaway for family members caring for a sick person.

Through Ski for Light, disabled people have been taken snow skiing, golfing, water skiing and even rock climbing. Dietrich envisions expanding on those activities.

The organization also will collect surplus adaptive equipment such as walkers and shower benches and get them to people who need them but can’t afford them, Dietrich said.

Dietrich said his wife noticed that he no longer used some of his equipment. “Mary asked, ‘What happens to all this stuff?’ We figured thousands of pieces of equipment go into landfills or end up in garages.”

They plan to build a network of contacts to have unused or surplus equipment shipped to South Dakota and then distributed locally and through the Internet.

Eleven board members have been named so far for Meeting the Need, which will be a private, nonprofit organization.

Dietrich guesses the entire project will cost about $2 million, but he said plans are preliminary. Organizers have raised about $3,700 so far in seed money, he said.

But he is not daunted by the task. He notes that he and a few others started Ski for Light in 1978 with $50. That program, which provides a skiing experience for people with disabilities, still is going.

“We’ll be tapping the community for donations,” Dietrich said. He also hopes to get grants from the South Dakota Historical Society to refurbish the old mining buildings.

The Dietrichs are living in one end of a metal building on the property and will provide the land for the project.

Dietrich said he hopes work on the old buildings can begin within 30 days and construction of the lodge can start in about six months.

He hopes to offer the lodging, equipment and other services for “as close to free as we can.”

He plans to operate the project with mostly volunteer staff.

Dietrich noted that Ski for Light still is 100 percent volunteer, with volunteers contributing about 14,000 hours a year.

“I don’t believe in having a lot of paid employees,” he said.

The senior President Bush recognized Ski for Light as the 80th Point of Light in his 1,000 Points of Light program.

Dietrich said he learned a lot while helping form Ski for Light. And like Ski for Light, he said, the Meet the Need project likely will evolve beyond his ideas.

“I have a vision, but I can’t wait to get these other guys in there. Like with Ski for Light, what I thought was going to happen wasn’t at all what happened.”

He said the Ski for Light organizers had nothing in common except helping people. “We ended up having a lot of fun. I think this will be fun, too.”

Anyone interested in helping the Meeting the Need project may call Dietrich at 666-4610.