Friday marks the beginning of the Sturgis rally. City leaders say they’re ready for everything that entails – from potential drunk driving to millions of dollars flooding into the Black Hills.
Motorcyclists have already descended onto the Black Hills, and this year marks the 85th annual rally in the small community of Sturgis.
While less than 10,000 live in the city, mayor Kevin Forrester says everything changes when 500,000 extra people show up.
“As always, with an event of this magnitude there are things that pop up and new priorities come sometimes minute-by-minute, but we’ve got a professional team with a ton of experience", Forrester said. "We’re in good hands.”
For example, the new director of the local ambulance service in Sturgis Aden Schillig comes to the table with decades of trauma first response experience, including ten rallies working as a life flight professional.
Forrester said the scale of the event provides money to the region but also creates yearly challenges.
“The Sturgis Motorcycle Rally is the single biggest tourism event in South Dakota," Forrester said. "I mean, we have tourism items that draw more people over a period of time, but this specific event is a big economic driver for the entire region. Obviously, our community can only hold so many people at any one time and when you’re talking about upwards of a half million people attending this event, the bucket of Sturgis is filled up with people.”
With the risk of drunk driving and thousands of additional motorcycles on the roads, Forrester said priorities are the same across the area.
“Safety is the top concern of every agency and community throughout the area here,” Forrester said/
The Sturgis Rally runs through August 10.