Fort Dearborn Post 364
LEGION RIDERS
The American Legion Riders
Meeting's every 4th Monday at 7 PM.
2026 Officers
Director...Mike Cardosi
Asst Director...Chris Phillips
Treasurer...Jim Pipitone
Secretary...Phil Smith
Run Coordinator...Rob Ferns (Moose)
Membership...Matt Klann
Judge Advocate...Ron Costello
Sgt At Arms...Dan Munroe
Chaplain...Tommy Meehan
Historian...Gary Pichini (Grizz)
Storekeeper...Roy Koenig
Quote Of The Moment...
Riding faster than everyone else only guarantees you'll ride alone.
A $50,000 head needs a $50,000 helmet. A $10 Head.....
Meeting Minutes
ALR Meeting Recap from Mar 23rd 2026
Director Mike Cardosi called the meeting to order at 7:00. We had a total of 17 members signed in and 1 guest.
A Roll-call of officers had 9 officers present. Excused were the Run Coordinator and the Storekeeper.
Sick Call and Relief: Dick Debene’s brother had a lung transplant last night. He’s still recovering but doing well.
Membership Report: We have 66 active members, plus 2 members which owe dues, giving us a grand total of 68 members. Reminder emails have been sent to our 2 delinquent members.
Upcoming Events:
Chili Cook-Off Sun Mar 29th
Sat Apr 11th Bike Blessing at Noon
Sat Apr 18th D’Frost Run at Motown HD
Sat Apr 25th Our Am-Legion Post 364’s 100th Birthday
Sun Apr 26th Mt Clemens ALR Bike Blessing
Fri May 8th Garden City Bike Night
Sat May 9th Our 1st Bike Nite will be from Noon to 3:00
Sun May 10th Garden City Bike Blessing (Mothers Day)
Sat May 23rd is our Memorial Day Steak Dinner
Mon May 25th is the Memorial Day Parade
Sat May 30th is the Grab & Run Banquet in Bangor MI
Committee Reports:
Bike Blessing
Everything is set. Flyers have been posted all around. We’ll have coffee and donuts available. We’ll need to set up a donation jar for the parish and we’ll need the bullhorn from the office.
Memorial Day Steak Dinner
The committee has not met yet but will meet after this meeting.
Bylaws Committee
Tommy Meehan reported that they want to incorporate the bylaw changes that Garden City has for Supporters.
Old Business:
Mike asked Phil if all the Year Patches for Hog Heaven had been mailed out? Phil responded no.
Mike mentioned he had made a list of events and printed out a bunch of copies. The copies were placed on the shelf where the rider plaques are. This is the schedule for the entire year. Dates scheduled later in the year could change, but this is what is planned now.
There are 5 Midday Bike Nights scheduled.
Sat May 9th ALR Bike Nite Noon – 3:00 2nd Sat
Sat Jun 13th ALR Bike Nite Noon – 3:00 2nd Sat
Sat Jul 18th ALR Bike Nite Noon – 3:00 3rd Sat
Sat Aug 22nd ALR Bike Nite Noon – 3:00 4th Sat
Sat Sep 22nd ALR Bike Nite Noon – 3:00 4th Sat
The next time you visit the Post, grab a calendar to keep up on what’s happening.
Last month our guest Dave Crider gave a talk on the Wall That Heals. It will be coming to Taylor MI on August 13-16 of this year. He’s looking for support especially from the riders as we typically escort the wall as it comes into town. Phil Smith attended their planning event and said they’re waiting on information from the VFW Riders. As we get more information, we’ll pass it on.
New Business:
Our Bike Blessing event is pretty much set, we don’t need to do anything more right now.
The Bike Night committee met and made a list of what we need to buy for the event. Mike Haykus gave the report, listing each item and their cost. We had Burgers, Cheese, Buns, Brats, Rolls, Plates, Ketchup, Mustard, Relish, etc. The total came out to just over $200 and so Mike was asking that we allocate $250 to cover food. A motion was made by Frank P. for $250, but during discussion someone mentioned that we should make it “not to exceed $300”. The motion was amended to $300 and seconded by Dan M. Motion Passed. Mike says that we have an account with Gordons where we can use our tax-free status on purchases. He plans to buy everything the week before our Bike Night. Jim asked when he needed the cash but Mike said he’d put it on his card and then Jim could reimburse him.
At our last meeting we talked about bringing back the Memorial Day Steak Dinner and we set up a committee to work on that. The committee was Phil Smith, Mike Haykus and Jim Pipitone. Danny Ryder said he would help if he was available. Phil Smith said they had not met yet, but they would meet after this meeting.
Next we talked about the Memorial Day Parade.
The Memorial Day Parade will be 100 this year and the mayor would like to see a very large parade. Also, it’s the 100th year for Our American Legion Post. Janet is getting some T-shirts that say 100 years and would like everyone that is in the parade to get one and wear it during the parade. This year the parade will be on Mon May 25th.
Mike needs to submit the application in a couple of weeks and wanted to know how many were planning to ride in the parade. Mike called for a show of hands and got 6. He’ll at least double that to cover for people who were not at the meeting. Mike also asked all our neighboring ALR Posts how many would be coming from their posts. He told them to respond by the end of this month. If he gets any responses, he’ll tally those with ours and submit the paperwork.
Mike also mentioned there is a “hold harmless agreement” that needs to be signed. It’s one agreement to cover the whole group. The agreement states that everyone has read the rules and everyone agrees to abide by them. Rules like only American or POW/MIA flags and no political banners. Banners should say things related to Memorial Day. Things like “Daisy’s Dance supports our troops” not “Learn to dance at Daisy’s Dance”. The theme is Memorial Day and honoring our fallen soldiers.
The plan is to meet at our post, and we’ll probably be KSU @8am, since we need to be there and staged by 9am. We should have a good crowd. Let’s just hope for good weather!
Mike said he’d like to do a lot more Grab and Run rides this year. Last Fri was a good day and he took the bike out. He was thinking about having a Grab and Run on Sat, but Sat did not turn out well. However, if a nice day comes up, Mike will get Chris to blast out a text message to meet at the post for a Grab and Run. It will be short notice but we’ll see who we get.
Mike also mentioned that the weekend after Memorial Day on Sat May 30th will be the Grab & Run Banquet in Bangor MI. Mike’s planning to go and was wondering who else was interested. Chris said he was planning to go also. It’s about a 3 hour ride, so we should meet early for this, maybe 9am KSU.
There was a discussion about having Supporters. Mike said that if we wanted to implement what Garden City has, then we need to write it into our bylaws and distribute it for a vote. There are other chapters that have slightly different rules and if we want to use their rules, we still need to write it into our bylaws and put it to a vote. Someone asked if we had to choose between the 3 choices or if we could make our own. The answer was we can make our own as long as it conforms to what is allowed by National. For example, we could combine elements of each of the 3 choices to make our own 4th choice.
More discussion occurred and it was trending towards using the Garden City rules. Danny made a motion that we should go with the Garden City rules and Dan M seconded. Since nobody had a printout of the Garden City bylaws, questions arose about what some people had seen online versus what others had heard, and it was very confusing. Chris suggested that we should have the Bylaws completely rewritten to how it will be after incorporating the Supporter before voting. He said voting on an idea might look different when it’s copied onto paper. Someone asked about how someone becomes a supporter at Garden City. Ron said it was a nomination process which only occurs during the general election period. However, Ron said it was not included in the email he received from Phil, and that Phils email wasn’t a complete listing of all the Supporter rules. Mike stated that because supporters cannot be granted until the end of the year, as long as we get this done by then we’ll be fine. Phil protested because he wanted to have a vote on the motion on the floor regarding using Garden City’s rules. So the vote occurred and the results were 8 Yea, 7 Nay, and 1 abstain. Passed. This motion was to have the bylaws committee rewrite our bylaws using Garden city’s rules. After the rewrite, the membership will still need to review and approve the bylaws.
For the good of the Legion Riders:
Jim mentioned that Pat Koenig had contacted him about making a donation to our organization to cover the cost of the steaks for our Memorial Day Steak Dinner. Pat said he’d contact Jim after his group had their meeting.
Meeting adjourned at 7:45.
Next meeting is Monday Apr 27th.