The sometimes uneasy coexistence between ski areas and the environment has come a long way since the public relations disaster several years ago when Killington’s bid to use treated wastewater for snowmaking was greeted with cartoons and bumper stickers proclaiming: “Where the affluent meet the effluent.” Ski areas are learning that sustainable development not only makes good economic sense, it can also make good marketing sense.
Take Sugarloaf USA, Me., which dusted off the old Killington proposal, put a slightly different spin on it and wound up with good publicity locally as well as on CNN International, Canadian TV and in Popular Science. Instead of using treated wastewater for snowmaking, Sugarloaf is using snowmaking to treat its wastewater.
“The snowmaking process has the ability to kill bacteria,” explained Larry Warren, former president of Sugarloaf who is now chairman of the quasi-municipal Carrabassett Valley Sanitary District, which is pioneering the new technology. “We’re using the snowmaking process to treat effluent and we don’t put it back on ski trails.”
Instead the effluent is treated at a 30-acre site two miles from the ski area. Six 35-foot snowmaking towers turn the effluent into de-contaminated snowpiles 50 to 65 feet high. As the snow melts, the treated wastewater seeps harmlessly into the groundwater table. In the summer, the effluent is treated through the same process, but because it is not cold enough to turn the wastewater into snow, it is simply sprayed into the woods.
“We’ve tried to manage it as a scientific process and we have encouraged questions from the environmental community around us,” Warren said.
Doing a familiar good deed, the management at Snowshoe, W.V., has let the state publicize an environmental initiative. For years, Snowshoe employees, in virtual anonymity, picked up the litter and cut the grass along the six-mile state road to the top of the resort. Then the area decided to “adopt” the road under West Virginia’s “Adopt a Highway” program. Employees continue to do litter control and grass cutting, only now Snowshoe gets credit for the work with signs put up by the state on both sides of the highway leading up to the resort.
“We’ve always done it,” said Joe Stevens, communications director. “Now we’re just getting credit for it.”
On the other hand, taking credit for good work in reclaiming the Upper Fraser River is something Winter Park, Colo., never seems to get around to. “I keep meaning to write a press release,” said Mary Nichols, communications coordinator. “But something else, like a new CEO, always comes up.”
Winter Park is the lead on the public-private effort to re-introduce trout to the Fraser. Over the years, sediment from winter sanding along Berthoud Pass and soil erosion from Winter Park’s ski slopes have all but destroyed the fragile trout habitat of the river. “There’s so much sediment, the river almost stops in some places during spring runoff,” Nichols said.
Currently, Winter Park along with the Forest Service, the state highway department and several water conservation bodies is focusing erosion control and sediment basin construction work on the Upper Fraser, but eventually the project will move downstream and encompass the whole river.
“We haven’t done much in terms of publicizing this,” Nichols said, “although we are planning to submit the project for an environmental award, which is one way of getting some publicity.”
Stratton Mountain, Vt., has taken another approach to environmental good deeds and good publicity. It hired a director of environmental affairs, possibly the only ski resort in the country with such a position. “I think a lot of the reason the ski industry has gotten a bad rap on the environment is because we’ve been reactionary instead of proactive,” said Bob Fries, Stratton president. “We need to get out in front on these issues and take a leadership role.”
Last February, Fries went proactive by hiring Michele Grenier, a Ph.D. aquatics biologist with 15 years of environmental management experience on both sides of the permit process. And as a former elected town selectman, Grenier also brings an understanding of the need for good public relations to the highly visible post. “I’m a big advocate of letting people know what you’re doing,” she said.
Grenier has an open mandate from Fries. She oversees the environmental approvals process and all construction activity at Stratton with an eye toward environmental compliance. She is setting up an environmental interpretive center at the top of the mountain, gives slide presentations and lectures on wildlife and flora found at Stratton to local groups, oversees a $10,000 grant to the Vermont Institute of Natural Sciences to study the black bear habitat on top of the mountain and lends her expertise to other local environmental projects.
“I think you could look at this position as a luxury,” Fries said. “But I think the longterm benefits of being on the environmental side are definitely worth it.”
An example of what happens when ski areas try to buck environmental groups comes from Giants Ridge, Minn.
For over two years, beginning in 1993, the area spent a million dollars in court fighting environmental groups in an effort to build an 18-hole golf course in the Superior National Forest.
“Environmental groups stopped us at every turn,” said Ron Greely, general manager. “After spending a lot of money, we decided it behooved us to listen and work with them.”
The area hired biologists, land-use planners, wildlife and flora experts and did everything they recommended. Take out a wetland, build two new ones. Destroy one marsh marigold, plant a dozen more in its place. Fighting environmentalists cost Giants Ridge $1 million, listening to them cost $2 million more. But the result, unveiled this past June 7, is a showcase 18-hole gem of a golf course, rave press reviews and a whole lot of in-house pride.
“It was cheaper to go overboard than go back to court, and it’s been more gratifying,” Greely said. “We’re extremely proud of it.”
The course, which Greely expects to be ranked among the nation’s top 10 municipal and top 10 mountain golf courses, has been featured in Golf Management Magazine and Golf Digest with promises of more favorable pieces to follow.
Crystal Mountain, Mich., didn’t wait to spend millions in court before it hired a team of topflight land-use planners. Eight years ago, they were brought in at the beginning of the master planning process and they remained during the build-out, alleviating potential problems.
“Using good land-use planners is not unique to the ski industry,” said Chris Maclnnes, vice president for sales and marketing. “But I think it is fairly unique for smaller and medium-sized resorts to engage top planners.”
The result has been much the same as at Giants Ridge. Crystal Mtn. received great press, good customer satisfaction, and last December, an award from the Northwest Michigan Roundtable on Tourism and Natural Resources for overall environmental stewardship.
