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Show Wed/Thurs/Fri, September 7-9, 2005 The Park Record MOUNTAIN TOWN NEWS $12 million nailed for open space along I-70 at Edwards, Colo. By ALLEN BEST Record guest writer EDWARDS, Colo. - The Vail Valley Foundation has come up with the $12 million necessary to preclude development of a 72acre parcel at Edwards. The property, some of which was formerly used as a gravel pit operation, is trie largest undeveloped portion of land along Interstate 70 in the upper Eagle Valley. Half of the money comes from the coffers of Eagle County government, with the balance from private donations secured by the foundation, a group traditionally known for its role in landing and hosting World Cup and other ski races. A key figure in the foundation is Harry Frampton. the managing partner in East West Partners, a Beaver Creek-based developer of high-end homes from Summit County to Truckee. The property is to be given a new name, Eagle River Preserve. A few trails, picnic grounds and perhaps a shelter will be allowed on the site, but ball fields and other such improvements will not. Some observers thought $12 million was far too much for the property, and urged the money instead be used for purchases of outlying areas. But Bobby Warner, a developer in Edwards, said in retrospect it will be viewed as the right thing to do, similar to a major open space purchase in Vail called Ford Park that was done in the late 1970s. •Ski area west of Denver likely to reopen this year IDAHO SPRINGS, Colo.. -The long-closed Squaw Pass Ski Area is now firmly scheduled for re-opening this year. The ski area is located 35 miles west of downtown Denver and a few miles south of Interstate 70, not far from the road to Mt. Evans. It will be the closest ski area to Denver, although Loveland is only 53 miles from downtown. However, the ski area will be close to about 30,000 to 40,000 people in the rapidly growing Evergreen-Conifer area. This re-opening represents the continued expansion of the ski industry after about 20 years of consolidation and even contraction. Nationally, several ski areas - most of them small and at lower elevations - have closed since the 1970s even as skier days stuck at a little more than 50 million. However, as baby boomers remain on their skis and a new population bulge of snowboarders in the echo boom come of age, the ski industry has been growing modestly again toward 60 million. Doing particularly well have been smaller ski areas close to cities. A model for other ski areas - apparently, including Squaw Pass, is California's Mountain High. Located 90 minutes from downtown Los Angeles, Mountain High has been able to post 500,000 skier days annually while appealing to teens and 20somethings. What's astounding is how little terrain they use. With lots of terrain parks, Mountain High has only 220 acres, the same as at Squaw Pass. That's 30 percent of the business of Vail but with just 4 percent of the terrain: But Squaw Pass has several major challenges. While Mountain High can draw on a population of 18 million residents in the Los Angeles Basin, Squaw Valley can draw on 2.4 million people in metropolitan Denver. Moreover, while LA snowboarders have few close-in options, Denver residents are within an hour or two of some of the continent's best ski areas. Squaw Pass last operated in 1975, two years after the 1973 opening of Eisenhower Tunnel made the ski areas of Summit County more accessible. Squaw Pass must also compete in prices. Skiing has become exorbitantly inexpensive in the last few years as Intrawest and Vail Resorts have battled for customer loyalty with season passes that only cost $300 while offering great variety. Remaining independents have similar dropped their rates. Finally, Squaw Pass must prove to have dependable snow, another Archilles heel that led to its closing more than 25 years ago. While the ski area is high enough, with a base area of 9,300, or the same as Keystone, it is located on the Eastern Slope, far from the Continental Divide. As such, snow tends to be sparse and uneven. The new owner, less Pettit, who purchased the ski area for $200,000, has installed snowmaking. Remaining to be seen is whether it's enough. Squaw Pass will have a new name, to be announced later this week. •Squaw Valley agrees to fine in water quality case TRUCKEE, Calif. - Squaw Valley Ski Corporation has agreed to pay the state of California $900,000 because of construction work that violated local, state, and federal environmental laws, California officials claimed that Squaw Valley built ski lifts and ski trails without permits, and that the company illegally dynamited an area to create a ski trail. The various activities caused the discharge of soil into a creek, altering two of its tributaries. The Sierra Sun reports a decade of bad blood between the ski area managers and government water-quality watchdogs. Since 1994, the company has been raided by armed federal agents, sued by the Sierra Club and the late billionaire William Hewlett, and repeatedly penalized by a regional water quality body. In 2002, that group, the Lahontan Regional Water Quality Control Board partnered with state government to take legal action against Squaw Valley. That action, which is rare, was provoked by what governmental officials said was a pattern of violations. It's not clear where the $900,000 will be used, although the Sierra Sun suggested it could be used for water quality projects in the Squaw Valley and Truckee areas. The agreement further outlines a schedule of fines if the ski area operator fails to monitor water quality and revegetate the resort. •Cops warn that they need real estate, too MT. CRESTED BUTTE, Colo. - The real estate market is going crazy in' Crested Butte. Agents are making money hand over fist. Town governments are ladling in transfer taxes. And now comes the other side of that sword - the affordability of housing for key personnel, like town cops. Hank Smith, who is the police chief in Mt. Crested butte, the slope-side town located two A-9 mm miles from Crested Butte, the old mining town, told his town council that people making $30,000 to $45,000 per year - the pay range for cops in the two towns - cannot afford to move there. "When you hire an outside person, he can't come here and buy a $600,000 home," he said. The alternative is to hire people already living locally, and then train them - an expensive proposition in its own right> Chris Morgan, the mayor .of Mr. Crested Butte, told Smith that the town council is aware of the problem and may earmark some of the 16 units of affordable housing being built in conjunction with a new second-home project to be set side for crucial town employees. •Bathing trunks becoming all the rage at hot springs LAS ALAMOS, N.M. Whatever in the world can be happening? Not that long ago you could skinny-dip your way across hot springs of the West. Maybe still can. But for whatever reason, bathing suits seem to have become de rigueur at a well-known hot springs in the Jemez Mountains of New Mexico, reports Durango Telegraph publisher Will Sands. "This isn't that kind of hot springs," he informed his wife as she prepared to put on her bathing suit. But after hiking up to the hot springs, where the hot mineral water bubbles straight out of the rock and into a series of natural pools, he found things had changed since his last visit. What followed, he reports, were 20 minutes of only-naked-man-in-theroom paranoia. Slinking back to the parking lot, he found another would-be lobster. "Is it crowded today?" the man wanted to know. "Is it ever," Sands replied. "There are probably eight bodies floating up there. The man flashed a knowing grin, held up his swimsuit and chuckled, "Eight, eh? Thins are different these days. You're just lucky you missed the big family reunion last weekend." Allen Best has edited mountain town newspapers for 20 years. He has served as managing editor at four different mountain town newspapers and is now living in metropolitan Denver. . KLEIN'S CUSTOM COUNTERTOPS SILE\T0NE, by Cosentino Pure Brilliance" Natural Quartz Countertops Safe*, Beautiful, Maintenance-Free . 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