Some communities are now finding a niche, offering an alternative to endless lift lines and soaring ticket prices. They're reopening, several as nonprofits, offering a mom-and-pop experience at a far lower cost than corporate-owned resorts.
LA VETA, Colorado — It’s been the longest wait, their whole lives, in fact. But Race Lessar and Landen Ozzello are finally right where they want to be, on a snowy slope close to home, molding snow into a ski jump.“I’m happy that it’s open for at least one year,” Lessar said. It opened as a nonprofit, and that may be the key. "I didn’t know that there was a hope,” he said.
Ski resorts boomed in the 70s and 80s, emerging even in areas that didn't have the climate or workers to sustain them long-term. First-time ski resort owners took on debt and quickly filed for bankruptcy after a bad snow season. Ownerships transferred numerous times before resorts calcified into ghost towns.
Finally, when cold air and snowstorms arrived in late winter, Cuchara's maintenance director had an idea. They welded old school bus seats to a car-hauling trailer and hitched it to a snowcat, a tractor with snow treads, then put out the word they would be towing people up the mountain. “We’re trying to give the community something because they’ve supported us for so long,” Clayton said.
“A high percentage of our kids would not be getting the opportunity if we weren't taking them,” Wipplinger said. “It opens up their world a little bit."If fond memories and volunteer spirit are essential to reopening an abandoned ski area as a nonprofit, so is snow, and its consistency dictates whether it can endure.
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