Author: Snow Menu
Published: Jul 5th, 2009
Category: News - Ski & Snowboard
Comments: 1

Killington ski village plan splits the community

Tags: Green Mountain ski resort, Killington ski resort, USA

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Ed Fowler has gone through 30 years and three different ski village proposals. With each new plan comes a new developer but the promise remains the same — they’ll build it and more people with more money will come flocking to the mountain resort town nestled in the serene Green Mountains.

Fowler, a stockbroker, moved to Killington 38 years ago to work for the resort known as the “Beast of the East” for its expansive terrain and ideal winter weather conditions.

Although he never did end up working on the mountain, he came to love the community and stayed.

Fowler watched as the town became home to a vibrant access road, a million-plus skiers in the late 1980s, and private developers’ plans to convince visitors to stay longer and spend more.

He also watched as slumping economic conditions through the years slowed traffic up to the peak, how town’s coffers started running low partly due to hundreds of thousands of dollars in unpaid property taxes, and how plans for a village lost traction.

Today, Killington finds itself wrestling with the latest and largest proposal for ski resort expansion ever presented to town planners and residents — a 408-acre mix of condominiums, new ski lodges, retail shops, and nearly everything else needed for the ideal family vacation, from an indoor water park and movie theater to an art gallery.

In the midst of a deep recession, the Utah-based company that owns the resort and the Texas-based financier and partner charged with developing the ski village plan are hoping to convince the town that their 25-year building plan will stand the test of hard times and make the area prosper with more skiers who will spend more money.

According to Fowler and local business owners, a lot is riding on how far this proposal gets – local businesses are hungry for more patrons and other resort areas are outpacing Killington by attracting more families and higher-end clientele through expansion and increased services.

“During the last eight years, there have been fewer skiers, fewer students and a 600 percent property tax increase that worked its way to other towns to pay for their education costs and many of the people have moved to adjacent communities,” Fowler said.

“One does not need to drive too far to see how Killington has lost its edge with its vacant buildings and for sale signs and the economy isn’t exactly making things easier,” he said.

While the majority of residents are in favor of a ski village, the town’s planner and other residents have concerns and say the plan needs to be vetted thoroughly by the town to make sure the developer builds what’s best.

According to former Select Board Chairman Norm Holcomb, the development is just as much the town’s as it is the developer’s.

“It’s so substantial that the town needs to make sure they don’t blow anything,” Holcomb said.

The bottom line

In 2008, Killington made roughly $101 million on skier visits – from meals, rooms, alcohol and retail sales, according to the state Department of Taxes.

Developers can’t say how much that number will be boosted when the ski village is complete in 20 to 25 years.

The town, on the other hand, has formed a new municipal economic development department that relies solely on funding from tourism and largely, skier visits – banking on at least $500,000 from a special local tax this year.

Ski resort development researchers and those who have witnessed a ski village’s effect on their own town say ski villages in Vermont have and can bring more business to the local communities they are built in.

In Stowe, an ongoing ski village development of a high-end, 139-room hotel, townhouses, shops, and a performing arts center has only helped bring patrons to the town’s own historic downtown, according to Ed Stahl, executive director of the Stowe Area Association.

“It has added another level of customer,” he said, referring to an influx of wealthier skiers.

Stahl said, “We haven’t lost anything, we’ve only gained,” referring to small, local businesses.

But according to one author and researcher, residents of ski resort communities in Vermont and out West can’t disregard the bottom line – the business plan of resort investors is to bring as many people to the village as possible and maximize on every dollar spent there.

Hal Clifford is the author of the book “Downhill Slide: Why the Corporate Ski Industry is Bad for Skiing, Ski Towns and the Environment,” and contributor to the 2007 documentary, “Resorting to Madness.”

Clifford said there’s an underlying “financial architecture” involved in ski village development – a “get them there, keep them there,” mentality focused on the baby boomer demographic and making the most of their money. In many cases, Clifford said the benefit to local businesses is only an afterthought.

“It’s important that people understand that the outsiders (corporate resort developers from outside Vermont) coming in, they are legally obliged to make as much money as they can for their shareholders,” Clifford said.

Killington Resort spokesman Tom Horrocks confirmed that the goal of Killington’s village is to “maximize the spend.”

“The folks that used to be the customer base here 15 years ago are now going to those big ski villages,” he said. “We don’t want to look at solely increasing the amount of people that come here,” he said. “We all (the resort and community) should be thinking of increasing the amount of money that people spend while they are here.”

Resort development in Vermont is highly regulated and according to Parker Riehle, president of the Vermont Ski Areas Association, the developer must show that there will not be an adverse impact on local businesses.

Unlike Colorado, Utah and other states that benefit from winter tourism, “visitors do not spend all their time and money at the village development but in fact do make their way into the local community and beyond to explore, shop, and eat, as evidenced by the 67 percent of skier/rider expenditures occurring off-mountain,” according to Riehle.

Skiers and riders spend approximately $750 million each winter season while in Vermont, with most money being spent outside of ski villages, Riehle said.

Steve Selbo, the president of developer and partial resort land-owner SP Land Co., said he can’t predict how the town’s tax base will be boosted when the multi-phased project is complete in 20 years or more. SP is the Killington affiliate of Texas-based real estate investment firm Ski Partners 2000.

“My strong feeling is that we are in the resort business and the whole community is in the resort business,” Selbo said.

Selbo said the state of the economy isn’t a factor in his plans – he said he expects at least two more economic cycles to pas before the village is complete.

“This would be great to do it in a big upswing but we aren’t there yet,” he said.

The community

An arduous town approval process has faced SP Land thus far.

The town’s planning commission has begun weeding through 28 specific town zoning criteria that the developer has to abide by to obtain approval for the village’s combined master plan and planned unit development before the application goes to the state for environmental permits.

Construction is slated to begin in 2011, the earliest.

Public hearings have exposed great support for the project, residents commenting – “The town should stand shoulder to shoulder with SP Land,” and “It will not only benefit Killington but Rutland County.”

“All the other ski areas that have villages, don’t have Rutland 9 miles away,” said Otto Iannantuoni, owner of the Green Brier Inn on Route 4 in Killington.

“They (new visitors) will be going to Rutland, Route 4 and have everyone going through it.”

But the latest plan has also exposed adversity from condominium association representatives and local business owners who say their rentals or restaurants won’t be able to compete with an inclusive ski village and won’t have equal access to new customer dollars.

Dick Marron, a business owner and selectman in Stowe who was involved in the town’s ski village approval process, said it only works when the resort has an appreciation for the town and vice versa.

“When people are concerned about the bottom line, they get involved in competition,” Marron said.

“What we like to do is be in competition as a whole with other areas and try to attract customers to Stowe, whether it’s the mountain, my place or someone else’s place.”

Fowler said most locals are ready to get the project started to bring Killington back up to pace.

“Locals aren’t against what these guys are going to build,” he said. “We’re concerned with when they are going to build.”

http://www.killington.com/