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Mountain News:

Mammoth ponders new financial tools

MAMMOTH, Calif. — As an aspiring destination resort, Mammoth is in a chicken-and-egg proposition. It does not now have the amenities that tourism officials there believe are necessary to draw visitors for more extended stays. Traditionally a weekends-use ski resort, it remains that to a greater extent than local boosters would like, despite massive expansion of base-villages by ski area operator Intrawest.

But how is this infrastructure to be financed in this build-it-and-hopefully-they-will-come vision? That, reports the Mammoth Times, is the question now before town officials and the community.

Among the ideas for generating revenues are an increase in the bed tax and the sales tax. But hoteliers turned out in force at a recent meeting to object to increasing the bed tax to 14 per cent. As one speaker said, they can’t justify charging that much when they don’t have the amenities to back it up. Better received is an increased sales tax.

And what does Mammoth need in terms of amenities? More child care, better transportation, and wireless fidelity Internet access across the town. "If we could turn this entire town into a ‘hot spot’ for Internet access, I guarantee you we would have people staying here longer," one hotelier said.

"Most people now need to work while they vacation," he added. "A lot of customers would stay four days instead of just a weekend if they could work while they are here."

Is skiing only for rich?

CRESTED BUTTE, Colo. — Is skiing a rich man’s sport? Arguably not, says John Norton, ex-officio president at Crested Butte Mountain Resort.

He points to Bode Miller, who grew up in New Hampshire in a family of modest means. Home schooled, he was released to cut loose on the local ski hills, where he learned to ski fast.

Norton’s choice as the world’s best woman skier is Croatia’s Janica Kostelic. Reared in a war-torn country, her father drove her to Slovenia regularly, putting all their clothes on so they could sleep in the car. "Her father was a passionate skier, and he passed that love onto the kids. And the kids got good. And now Janica is the best," says Norton, writing in the Crested Butte News.

"It’s true we can spend lots of money on skiing – but does that make it a rich man’s sport?" adds Norton. "We all find ways to do the things we love."

Record year for retail

ASPEN, Colo. — One of Aspen’s nicknames is Glamour Gulch. Maybe it should be called Big Bucks Basin.

The town last year recorded more than $400 million in retail sales, a new record. Overall, sales were up 9.2 per cent, with only T-shirts and specialty retail items like luggage and antiques declining. Particularly impressive were sales during December, which were up 16 per cent over the previous year.

But as much as this was a gangbuster year in Aspen, the buying power of the tax collections is actually less than what was being collected a decade ago. That’s the same story across much of the ski towns of the West, where the economy has shifted from tourism to real estate. Second-home owners and the newly retired locals who make up a larger percentage of the real-estate owners in the ski towns don’t spend as much money as tourists splurging on a week’s vacation.

Firefighters commuting

SUMMIT COUNTY, Colo. — A new report from the Summit Housing Authority describes a formidable challenge in coming years. With job totals growing rapidly, 4,000 additional housing units will be needed within five years to house the locals. And not just any old housing, but cheaper units — $112,000 to $268,000.

Already, some of the paid firefighters are commuting from Denver, located about 75 miles away, where housing is much cheaper. They are among the 13 per cent of workers in the county who commute from beyond county lines; that figure is expected to increase to 20 per cent during the next five years.

The Summit Daily News notes that this issue will become more prominent yet when a hospital opens during the next year or two. As well, the report notes the local economy is shifting somewhat from the lower-paying tourism jobs to the somewhat higher paying jobs associated with financing, design, and construction of expensive vacation and retirement homes.

$600,000 is affordable

ASPEN, Colo. — A planned employee housing project in Aspen called Burlingame Ranch should be capped at a starting price of $600,000, the Aspen-Pitkin County housing board says. The board wants to avoid hitting the $1 million cap, which has been breached in the resale of several homes in another housing project designed to make Aspen affordable for doctors and lawyers and such.

The housing board also wants a cap on home sizes of 2,200 square feet plus 500 more for a garage.

Developer uses "D" word

VAIL, Colo. — "Developer" and "density" are dirty words in many mountain communities, but another D-word, downzone, is now being used by a prominent developer from Vail and Beaver Creek.

Harry Frampton, managing partner of East West Partners, says it’s time to slow the growth in the Eagle Valley, where Vail is located. The population has been nearly doubling for every decade since Vail opened in 1962, and at the current pace is projected to hit 80,000 within a couple more decades.

"It makes me nervous… I’m not sure we’ve thought through the implications," Frampton told a recent gathering in Vail.

As the developer of homes for mostly the super-wealthy, particularly in Beaver Creek, Frampton’s firm has helped cause Eagle County’s growth-on-steroids population gains. But he points to Breckenridge, where his firm has also developed, as a place that got it right.

Breckenridge, he said, had a potential to grow to 50,000 but instead has targeted 25,000 to 27,000. "They did the unthinkable. They down-zoned. They purchased conservation easements and transferred some development rights to other towns," he said. "We need to learn from our friends in Breckenridge and go through this very messy and complicated process. We will be 100 times better off if we do."

Restraint urged

ASPEN, Colo. — A star student in environmental affairs, the Aspen Skiing Co. has been getting red ink in response to its plan to make a so-called backcountry area within the Snowmass Ski Area more accessible.

Although relatively few people bothered to comment on the proposal now before the U.S. Forest Service, most who did urged the ski company to show restraint, reports The Aspen Times. Several want to see the ski area "surrender" any plans to erect a ski lift tin the area.

Beetles continue on tour

BANFF, Alberta — Those tracking pine beetles around Banff would love to see an old-fashioned cold snap in the next month or more. A week of 40 below temperatures would do fine, they say. That’s the easiest way to curb the spread of bark beetles, which have been finding the warmer winters and aging trees in the Bow River Valley to their liking.

The Rocky Mountain Outlook explains that Alberta’s problem with the spread of bark beetles is minor compared with that of British Columbia, where up to nine million hectares of trees have been killed. While 90 per cent of each year’s brood of bark beetles typically die, that still leaves 10 new beetles from every adult when the insects are in their epidemic cycle.

Land prices climb

STEAMBOAT SPRINGS, Colo. — The price of land has been appreciating rapidly in Steamboat Springs, with residential lot prices rising by about 20 per cent in the last two years.

While all real estates prices have been rising in resorts across the West, land has been rising more rapidly. In 1996, for example, the land at one lot in Steamboat represented 26 per cent of the total valuation of the property. By 2003, the value of the lot had more than doubled, but more important, the land itself represented 45 per cent of the total, explains The Steamboat Pilot.

If Steamboat’s progression follows the same track as more highly developed resort towns like Aspen and Vail, the market will soon reach the point that people will buy homes for the value of the land, scraping off existing homes to build more modern and usually larger homes.

Housing popular

VAIL, Colo. — In the wake of 9/11, when construction of second-home mansions nearly ended and tourism slowed way down, a bevy of affordable housing sprouted in Vail and the Eagle Valley even as vacancy rates soared.

Amid all this Vail noisily debated a giant new for-rent affordable housing project located prominently near the town’s main roundabouts along I-70. Critics said it would sit empty, and others warned that the 142 units would become a seasonal housing ghetto.

Time will tell on the ghetto part, but the 142 units are definitely not sitting empty. Occupancy was at 97 per cent in January. One of the theories is that the big losers were those landlords trying to rent out substandard housing and at high prices.

Alike but opposites

Similarities of immigrants and second-home owners

BASALT, Colo. — Latino immigrants are like second-home owners, except that they’re at opposite ends of the economic spectrum. That was one analysis at a recent meeting of the Basalt Town Council, which met with a task force that hopes to get better help integrating Latinos in the Roaring Fork Valley into the more established communities.

Both second-home owners and Latinos haven’t been permanent residents, and local governments would like to see more engagement from both in the community, notes The Aspen Times.

Tahoe has lots of snow

LAKE TAHOE, Calif. — The Sierra Nevada got pounded by storms in January, sending the snowpack to 154 per cent of average. But is the drought there over? Last January’s snowpack was similarly high, 120 per cent of average, but then March hit. By the end of April, the snowpack was only 66 per cent of average, notes the Tahoe Daily Tribune.

Still, there’s enough snow that Heavenly Mountain Resort has announced it will remain open for skiing to May 1.

Durangans seek smoking ban

DURANGO, Colo. — A group has approached the Durango City Council in hopes of getting smoking eliminated from all bars and restaurants. An estimated 60 to 65 per cent of them already ban smoking.

Those calling for the ban cite the dangers of second-hand smoke to employees. "Breathing second-and smoke should not be a condition of employment," said Char Day, the group’s co-ordinator.

The counter-argument comes from Jim Carver, a baker and brewer. He won’t patronize businesses that allow smoking, but he does not want government to tell businesses what they can do. "The market rewards those who decide to go nonsmoking," he told the Durango Herald.

A similar proposal in Durango failed in 1994.

Group wants to display bulldozer

GRANBY, Colo. — The debate over the future of the concrete-and-steel fortified bulldozer that rampaged through Granby last June, causing $5 million in damage, continues. Although a judicial court has ordered it destroyed and bestowed custody on the county sheriff, the local historical association would like to get the bulldozer and eventually put it on display.

"This is a significant event in the history of Grand County," said Don Woster, the executive director of the Grand County Historical Association. In considering the bulldozer, it should be considered from the perspective of 50 years from now, he said.

Law enforcement officials insist that the more important consideration is what would happen if it got in the hands of those who wanted to glorify the rampage and Marvin Heemeyer, the municipal malcontent who created it, explains the Sky-Hi News.