After fielding a respectable 52-member exhibition corps from the Arizona desert last summer, CopperStar will be inactive for the 2002 season. The corps is sending its remaining 22 members to march with the Troopers and already is making plans to re-launch the corps in November.

"It would have been a shortened season," said Robert Taylor, former CopperStar Director and current board member. "It would not have been to the quality we would all have liked. It would not have been a growth experience. I know the kids love the corps and believe in the corps, but if it's not a quality program, we're not coming out."

This would have been the corps' first competitive season in Drum Corps International. Taylor served as the corps director through December and had recruited a strong membership that he said was "in the high-'60s to low-'80s." But after he resigned as the director in January, many of the kids he recruited left for greener football fields. That left new director Arthur Hood with 28 members.

"The board of directors made the decision to take the corps off the field in 2002," Taylor said, "due to funding issues that I believe are due in part to September 11 and corporations pulling back funding. We believe the only way the corps should come out is with the bills paid." Taylor said that Native American bingo games are very successful in the Gilbert, AZ area, but the corps hasn't been able to get one started.

"A car wash only brings in $400 and bake sales only go so far," Taylor said, especially when the organization's travel expenses are so high. "The closest show for us is a six-hour drive to Southern California, besides the one show in Phoenix. But that show is in the middle of tour, so we're already on our way back from California. It's just part of tour."

Taylor has forged a handshake agreement with Troopers Director Mathew Krum to send the remaining kids and some CopperStar volunteers to the Casper, WY division I corps. Krum was not available for comment at press time, but a Troopers office staff member said the corps is hoping that this infusion of members will help them field a 90-member corps this summer.

"I'm proud of each and every one of the kids," Taylor said. "The fact that they're so dedicated to our corps and yet so enthusiastic about the activity to do this is amazing. Whoever wants to return to the Troopers (in 2003), we welcome that. If they want to come back to CopperStar, we welcome that."

Krum and his caption heads ran the camp for the ex-CopperStar kids last weekend...