Ski area's setback sends chills

As much as from the two-hour climb, Mueller's weariness lingers from the fight to grow his resort. He has spent four years and nearly $2 million working to expand the ski area he bought with his family in 2003. Then four months ago, the U.S. Forest Service decided it opposed lift-served skiing on Snodgrass Mountain. That decision ended a long journey toward formal review and reversed two decades of apparent Forest Service support for lift- served skiing on Snodgrass. Now, the Mueller clan finds itself at the heart of an acrimonious battle between the Forest Service and Colorado resorts that are alarmed the decision — after years of Forest Service support — spells trouble for other expansion plans. While the Forest Service denies any change in policy, industry leaders fear the roots of the Snodgrass denial lie in a fundamental shift that has the agency worried about declines in vacationers and favoring expansion closer to population centers. "What we want the Forest Service to understand is that we are concerned that they have changed the rules in midstream and if this partnership is going to continue to thrive, we think they need to revisit the process," said Michael Berry, president of the National Ski Areas Association, which represents 332 American ski hills, 135 of which use federal land. "If you are a ski-area operator and you go through this public process and do all this master planning and spend all this money and then one person in a backroom says, 'I've changed my mind,' well, if that's the way the agency is going to make decisions going forward, we are all in trouble," said Melanie Mills, president of the 22-resort trade group Colorado Ski Country. The Forest Service decision at Crested Butte is not the only federal action causing industry consternation. In Arizona, the agency has refused to allow upgrades it had already approved at Snowbowl, despite Court of Appeals support and $5 million in planning over eight years...read more