Photo from Breckenridge Ski Resort
Breckenridge Ski Resort has announced that it will be closing down skiing and snowboarding operations earlier than anticipated. While the resort planned to stay open through Memorial Day on Tuesday, May 18, that closing day would be moved up to Sunday, May 23.
A tweet from the resort stated that “while we were aiming to ride with you through Memorial Day, Mother Nature had other plans,” alluding to the below-average snow year Summit County has experienced. The resort added that it plans to operate throughout May in future ski seasons.
Breckenridge plans to open up its summer operations June 18, which will include the opening of lift-served mountain biking, the GoldRunner Coaster and Alpine slides.
The Breckenridge Tourism Office recently released a report with its local lodging occupancy rates for the winter season and a forecast for what the upcoming summer might look like. Though last season’s numbers are still.
Park Record file photo
With Parkites shifting their focus from skiing to summertime pursuits, the contract between Park City Mountain Resort and its ski patrollers quietly expired May 1, with the sides still unable to strike a multi-year deal nine months after sitting down at the bargaining table.
That’s an “unprecedented” length of time, according to the local union leader, one during which ski patrols in two popular destinations in Colorado and Montana have voted to begin their own unions.
PCMR spokesperson Jessica Miller said in a prepared statement that resort owner Vail Resorts continues to bargain in good faith with the Park City patrol union, and that there are negotiation sessions scheduled throughout this month.
Photo by Liz Copan / Studio Copan
The Keystone Ski Patrol voted 42-36 against unionization, according to the updated vote tally.
Ski patrollers at Keystone Resort filed a petition seeking an election for union representation with the National Labor Relations Board in February, an effort following the unionization of ski patrollers at other ski areas in recent years like Park City Mountain Resort, Steamboat Resort and Telluride Ski Resort.
Jonathan Cernanec, a Keystone ski patroller and one of the leaders of the effort, explained that the patrollers wanted to unionize to make ski patrolling a more sustainable career with compensation that reflects the responsibilities that come with the job. The starting hourly wage for a ski patroller at Keystone is $13.25, Cernanec said, one dollar above Vail Resorts’ base pay of $12.25 per hour in Colorado.