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SAM Magazine—Montpelier, Vt., Jan. 22, 2015—Doug Hoffer, Vermont State Auditor, said the state should to be charging higher rates for use of its mountain lands. Hoffer says the money the state gets out of current lease payments, about $3 million, doesn't reflect the value of the state's land, according to a report by Vermont Public Radio (VPR).

SAM Magazine—Montpelier, Vt., Jan. 22, 2015—Doug Hoffer, Vermont State Auditor, said the state should to be charging higher rates for use of its mountain lands. Hoffer says the money the state gets out of current lease payments, about $3 million, doesn't reflect the value of the state's land, according to a report by Vermont Public Radio (VPR).

However, most of the current leases aren't up for renewal for nearly 40 years, and terms cannot be changed without permission from the ski areas. Those areas include Stowe, Okemo, Smugglers' Notch, Jay Peak, Killington, Burke, and Bromley. All together they lease about 8,500 acres of state land.

So Hoffer hopes to start a conversation in the Legislature about how to compel ski areas to revise the terms of their leases prior to their expiration.

“The industry developed and grew and has become a very important part of the state's economy. Having said that, can we justify a lease payment established 50 years ago? Are we getting a fair return? I think the answer is probably no,” Hoffer told VPR. He said the state isn't seeing revenue increases commensurate with the growth in the ski resort industry because the lease payments are tied largely to ticket sales. He added the value of nearby condos, restaurants, golf courses and other amenities derive their value from the public land, too.

Parker Riehle, president Ski Vermont, agreed that ski area expansions have led to commercial and real estate development in rural communities. “That in turn has benefited the state enormously through the collection of rooms-and-meals tax revenues, and sales tax revenues, adjacent to those state land leaseholds,” Riehle said. In short, the state is already getting a bigger return than the $3 million in resort lease payments.

Other state officials are split on the lease issue. Mike Fraysier, lands administration director at the Agency of Natural Resources that oversees the leases, said the ski leases generate more revenue than other publicly administered ski leases. Michael Snyder, commissioner of forest, parks and recreation told VPR he want to make the lease payments “as big as they can possibly be, reasonably and legally.”

Meanwhile in Colorado, the 11 ski areas that operate in the White River National Forest broke the record for fees they paid to use public lands during the past fiscal year. The U.S. Forest Service reported that resorts paid a combined $16 million during the 2014 fiscal year, up more than $2 million from the 2013 fiscal year. The fee increases reflect record skier and snowboarder visits in Colorado last season and also growing summer operations at ski areas.