Millions are at stake in short-term rental debate, company says

#Summit County #Colorado

Michael Yearout Photography

Summit Daily Link

The smallest change in the lodging industry can represent millions of dollars in its overall economic impact, according to company officials with Summit Mountain Rentals, who say they're hoping to spark a fact-based conversation regarding short-term rentals as local governments consider imposing new regulations on the growing industry.

To help facilitate that conversation, the property-management company working out of Breckenridge and Frisco has produced an analysis of the towns' most recent sales tax reports related to lodging that suggests short-term rentals account for an even greater slice of the economic pie than many might think.

In Breckenridge, for example, the company notes that lodging was a $147 million industry in 2017. While this statistic includes hotels and inns, as well as short-term rental properties like the ones posted on Airbnb.com and VRBO.com, the company contends the sector had an overall direct economic impact of $442 million last year alone.

To show how important short-term rentals are to the strength of the local economy, Summit Mountain Rentals also pointed to recently released data from Airbnb.com ranking Breckenridge — with 89,000 guests paying $16.5 million in 2017 — as its second-highest market in Colorado behind Denver.

Additionally, the Breckenridge Tourism Office reported in 2016 that vacation visitors contributed $313 million to the town's economy between lodging and other purchases, meaning that nearly one-third of all the town's taxes came from lodging, according to Summit Mountain Rentals.

"It's also important to remember this is from the town of Breckenridge so this is capturing just the lodging units that are within town limits," said Gavin Dalgliesh, the company's marketing and revenue manager, further explaining that properties just outside of town limits, like ones in Blue River, were not incorporated in the figures.

Turning the focus to Frisco, Summit Mountain Rentals' analysis suggests that with the town collecting $380,326 in sales tax revenue from short-term rentals in 2017, they had a total impact of $228 million on Frisco's economy last year.

In the analysis, the company used the towns' sales tax reports for the baseline data before multiplying those figures by "conservative" estimates to try to determine the overall economic impact. However, those figures "are an approximate calculation" and "cannot be confirmed" by the Breckenridge Tourism Office, according to a spokeswoman for the organization. Likewise, Frisco revenue specialist Chad Most also wouldn't endorse the company's analysis on Frisco's behalf, but the accountant said he didn't want to undermine it, either.

Like many things in life, Most explained, the "devil is always in the details." Without splitting hairs on the "underlying assumptions," he wholeheartedly agreed with the idea that short-term rentals play a major role in the local economy, a fact that's clearly illustrated in Frisco's sales tax and lodging reports.

"Yeah, it's a pretty large impact," Most said. "That's for sure."

He also confirmed that company representatives sat down with him for over 45 minutes to go over the analysis, and if someone is willing to accept the assumptions, Most said the figures should be considered "valid" and thought of as "a valuable starting point for a discussion."

And that's really what the people at Summit Mountain Rentals say they want — to be included in the discussion — as towns like Frisco consider imposing new regulations on the industry.

Contrary to what some may think, Reid Tulley, marketing communications manager for Summit Mountain Rentals, said that the company actually doesn't mind rules, and in many cases welcomes them. He just hopes local governments "will consider all the facts and data that support the reason they're making these rules" when they do so.

"We're really just trying to shed some light on the situation," Tulley explained. "We want to start the conversation, make ourselves available if they need any supporting data from the professionals and put ourselves out there as the people who really have our fingers on the pulse of this industry in the local market."

According to Tulley, concerns over rowdy guests are mostly overstated, as he said he's looked over the police department's calls in Frisco regarding short-term rentals and they constitute only a small fraction of the overall number of complaints police field.

"We don't see too much of it," Tulley said of the noise complaints. "I think if we look at it on a yearly basis, it wasn't even one a month."

Another complaint often levied against short-term rentals is that they're gobbling up the available housing with long-term rental housing being converted to short-term vacation properties, further exacerbating Summit County's housing crisis. However, that's another misconception, according to David Scott, Summit Mountain Rentals marketing director.

To back up his point, Scott highlighted figures showing the number of short-term rentals in Frisco has actually fallen over the last five years at the same time the housing crunch has only gotten worse, saying that with the number of short-term rental properties in Frisco dipping from more than 1,000 in 2012 to 867 in 2016, "it's hard to maintain that short-term rentals are growing in Frisco and negatively impacting the long-term rental market."

In reality, Tulley contended professional property-management companies are "local governments' best friends and allies" in ensuring tax compliance and following local regulations.

"There's a lot of coverage about short-term rentals — 'Oh, they're bad,' and this, that and other things," he said. "But we just want everybody to take a step back and say, 'Hey, this is a huge part or our economy up here so let's get everybody in on the conversation.'"

As far as a workable model goes, Tulley points to existing regulations in Breckenridge as something other towns and counties might want to consider when looking to craft regulations of their own.

"We like Breckenridge's model," said Tulley, highlighting a recent study that found over 98 percent of the 3,526 short-term properties in town were complying with its rules and collecting the 3.4 percent lodging tax. "It works for us, it seems to work for the town and it seems to work for rentals-by-owners."

Summit State of the River meeting to feature keynote address from state climatologist

#Summit County #Colorado

Summit Daily Link

Russ Schumacher, Colorado's newly named state climatologist, will deliver the keynote address at the Summit State of the River meeting set for Wednesday, May 2, at the Silverthorne Pavilion.

Bureau of Reclamation and Denver Water officials will also discuss reservoir operations at Green Mountain and Dillon, and new Colorado River District general manager Andy Mueller will address Western Slope water priorities.

Western Colorado had a difficult snow year this past winter, although Summit County did well with roughly 95 percent of the annual average snow level through April. Parts of southern Colorado, however, saw snowpack percentages as low as the 30s and 40s.

As a result, Colorado River Basin inflow into Lake Powell is projected to be 41 percent of average. Colorado's new state climatologist, Russ Schumacher, will address these weather trends and more at the Wednesday, May 2, Summit State of the River free public meeting at the Silverthorne Pavilion. Light food will be available at 5:30 p.m. The program begins at 6 p.m.

The Colorado River District's new general manager, Andy Mueller, will also be a featured speaker. The River District board hired Mueller this past December to take over for longtime water leader Eric Kuhn, who retired. Mueller will talk about how protecting irrigated agriculture in western Colorado is tied to recreational use of water, environmental values and Lake Powell.

Summit County water commissioner Troy Wineland will discuss local water supply and streamflow predictions. Also, officials from the Bureau of Reclamation and Denver Water will be on hand to detail operations this year at Green Mountain and Dillon reservoirs, two key water bodies in Summit County.

This is the 25th edition of the Summit State of the River water education meetings. Sponsors are the Blue River Watershed Group and the Colorado River District.

Are e-bikes the future or a scourge on Summit County’s recreation paths?

#Summit County #Colorado

Summit Daily

Summit Daily Link

Summit County is slowly pedaling toward a decision on e-bikes.

County commissioners declared Tuesday that while they need more information before lifting a temporary ban of e-bikes from the county's paved recreation paths, they will start the process of gaining U.S. Forest Service approval of the eletric-powered vehicles before making a final decision. The commissioners came around to the idea after receiving a report from the county's open space and trails department, which found that more Summit residents favor allowing e-bikes on paved pathways than opposed it.

At the moment, Summit County has a prohibition on any motorized vehicle on recreation paths. The state passed a law last year that determined e-bikes are not motorized vehicles. However, that same law gave local governments, like Summit County, the ability to draft and enforce their own regulations on e-bikes.

Last year's development spurred Summit's commissioners to make real progress toward a uniform standard that aligns with neighboring towns and counties. One such town is Vail, which adopted Colorado's state law as its own and allows e-bikes on its rec paths.

At the commissioner's work session on Tuesday morning, open space and trails director Brian Lorch, accompanied by resource specialist Michael Wurzel, presented the responses to a survey conducted last month among Summit residents to gauge public sentiment about e-bikes. On the question of whether to allow e-bikes on paved rec paths, 50 percent of respondents said they were for it, while 39 percent said they were against. Another 7 percent said they'd allow limited use of the rec paths, while the remaining 4 percent said they were undecided. Lorch said that this indicated there was no firm community consensus quite yet.

As far as recommendations, Lorch said his department drew upon public comment as well as feedback from Summit County and Breck's open space advisory councils to endorse one of two options. The first option was for the county to only allow Class 1 e-bikes — e-bikes that require pedal assist and are limited in speed — on rec paths while keeping the prohibition against Class 2 and 3 e-bikes, which are not pedal assisted and run at faster speeds.

The other option, based on a recommendation from the open space advisory councils, was to maintain the current prohibition on all e-bikes and gather more information, especially from communities like Vail that have allowed them. That would offer the county more time to gather formal approval from the towns and conduct more studies on e-bike effects on local paths.

Commissioner Dan Gibbs said that he had been skeptical about e-bikes in the past, but has become more open to their use.

"If you asked me few months ago what I thought, I had serious reservations and would've said no," Gibbs said. "But after riding one, and participating in open forums and talking to people, I feel more comfortable of moving forward on a process, one that would get the Forest Service involved."

Gibbs referred to the fact that the U.S. Forest Service, which owns much of the open land in Summit, would need to do an environmental study to permit e-bikes on the paths. Depending on how extensive that review is, it may take a year or more before approval is given.

Commissioner Karn Stiegelmeier seemed to be sticking to her guns and leaned toward maintaining the prohibition, citing concerns about increased traffic on rec paths that are already crowded, as well as the prospect that allowing e-bikes would lead to a "slippery slope" of other quasi-motorized vehicles on paths. However, she concluded she was still open to allowing Class 1 e-bikes after more information is gathered.

"(The advisory council option) gives us more wait and see time," Stiegelmeier said. "I don't feel we have enough info to approve class 2. Most likely we will be considering class 1 only."

Commissioner Thomas Davidson said he was in favor of moving the process forward, but still wanted to make a final decision when the board had more information available.

"We need to start a process with Forest Service," Davidson said. "We should not have to wait another year before making a decision, and even a minor environmental review takes a lot of time."

Davidson said that the deliberate and hyper-local approach was necessary, as the county could not make a rash decision without considering long-term consequences that would negatively affect Summit.

"I think we need flexibility beyond just this class system that the state has come up with, because I think in the future there's going to be all sorts of devices communities will have to deal with and make rules for. We can't just keep going to the Forest Service for approval each time."

Several members of the public offered comment after the work session, entirely in support of permitting e-bikes on the rec paths.

Thos McDonald, owner of Alpine Sports in Breckenridge, said he has seen universal approval for e-bikes after customers tried them out.

"You ride these bikes and you smile," McDonald said. "You're shocked at how smooth it is."

McDonald added that the concerns about increased crowding on rec paths were overblown, both because more bikers would transition to e-bikes and because e-bikes allowed people to ride farther.

"The number of people riding on the path will be dispersed," McDonald said. "People will just ride farther. They might ride to Dillon, then they might ride to Frisco, then to Breck. They'll ride in the same numbers, they're just going to ride farther. With these Class 1 e-bikes you're still pedaling, and it still takes work, but ride farther."

McDonald offered for any of the commissioners, or any other members of the public, to go to his store near City Market in Breckenridge to try them out.

Gayle Quigley, a long-time Breckenridge resident, said that e-bikes had changed her life for the better and was disappointed when the town banned their use on the rec paths.

"It lets me bike down to Frisco, without having to get off my bike to walk it up a hill," Quigley said. "It won't stop other biker traffic to go continuously on uphill slopes."

Quigley added that the county should not stand in the way of progress, especially since the transition to e-bikes was part of the fight against climate change.

"People moving toward e-bikes and away from cars, that's the direction we should be going," she said.

Breckenridge breaks ground on $50 million water treatment plant

#Breckenridge #Colorado

Summit Daily

Summit Daily Link

Building a second water treatment plant might not be the most glamorous development in Breckenridge history, but it could be one of the most important.

Public officials ceremoniously broke ground on the town's new water treatment plant Tuesday afternoon, signifying the beginning of a three-year process that, once complete, will address future water needs while giving the town a backup supply where one doesn't currently exist.

"It's the kind of thing that will probably go unsung in the community, but years from now, I think, we'll all look back on this and realize what a wonderful opportunity it was for us to secure the future for the people who live here," Breckenridge Mayor Eric Mamula told a small gathering decked out in hardhats and yellow vests at the construction site for Tuesday's groundbreaking.

The new plant is going up on the northern end of town at Highway 9 and Stan Miller Drive. Once complete, it will have the capacity to produce 3 million gallons of clean water daily, according to James Phelps, director of public works.

"This project is essential to the community's economy, natural environment and quality of life for the citizens of Breckenridge," Phelps said.

But it's not going to come cheap.

The town has allocated $50 million for construction of the second water treatment plant in the 2018 budget, and neither the price tag nor the importance of the moment was lost on the town mayor.

"This is the single biggest project, I think, we've ever done as a community, both in scope and cost," Mamula told Tuesday's crowd. "It's a little nerve-racking, honestly, to be one of the people that's standing up here pushing this, but it's super critical. We can't live at the end of the line like we do and not think that one day we're going to have a problem at the other plant."

As far as town staff can tell, Mamula was right: the North Water Treatment Plant, as it's been named, stands as the largest capital spend Breckenridge has ever made on a single project to date.

However, those same officials also expect the new plant to be an invaluable resource for the next 50 years or longer, not only addressing critical needs related to future growth but by giving the town its much needed backup, which would be critical should something like a wildfire flare up by the Gary Roberts Water Treatment Plant and threaten the town's existing water supply.

The existing supply could also be jeopardized by extreme drought conditions. In addition to fears of drought and wildfires, other concerns about having a redundancy of treatment capacity, maintaining operational flexibility and protecting the environmental health of the river have also come up since the project started really taking shape with a 2013 feasibility study.

Moltz Construction has already begun work on the second plant, and the town expects crews to wrap up in the summer of 2020.

The timeline is important because the Goose Pasture Tarn Dam, built in 1965, has an eroding spillway, and the town can't start on those repairs in earnest until the Gary Roberts Water Treatment Plant, which is located next the dam, can be turned off. But that can't happen without cutting off the town's only water supply until the new plant is up and running.

The good news is local and state officials have both expressed supreme confidence the dam will hold given current mitigation efforts, like keeping the reservoir at below-normal levels.

During his remarks, Mamula also lauded previous town councils, for without their work, he said, Breckenridge wouldn't have the water rights "to pull something like this off."

"And the town of Breck is rich in water," the mayor continued. "That's the one thing I think that we outshine almost every other community in the region is with the water we own."

One additional caveat related to construction of the second water treatment plant, the recreation path between Shores Lane and Gateway Drive has been closed and will remain so until late May. The path has been re-routed on the west portion of Highway 9, and the section is expected to reopen before Memorial Day Weekend.

For more information and regular project updates, go to TownOfBreckenridge.com/live/public-utilities/water/second-water-plan.

Breckenridge, Keystone to open lifts for summer June 8; golf courses in May

#Summit County #Colorado

Summit Daily

Summit Daily Link

Vail Resorts properties Breckenridge Ski Resort and Keystone Resort will open their lifts back up for summer operations on Friday, June 8.

Vail Mountain will open its lifts for summer a week earlier, on June 1, although it'll be for the weekend only. Over at Beaver Creek Resort, summer lift operations will open for the weekend of June 9 before opening for the full week on Saturday, June 16.

At Breckenridge, this summer will be the first full-length season it will offer its "Epic Discovery," outdoor activities, which are designed to immerse guests in Breckenridge's high alpine environment.

This summer's Epic Discovery programming will feature the Alpine Camp, where guests can zip, climb, soar and explore on the Expedition Zip Line Tour, the Alpineer Challenge Course, the Gold Summit Climbing Wall, Observation Tower and the Interpretive Hiking Loop, among other options.

At Keystone, the golf season is scheduled to tee off on Friday, May 11 at the River Course and Friday, May 25 at the Keystone Ranch Golf Course. Keystone's summer offerings also include its downhill mountain bike park, mountaintop adventures and free daily Kidtopia family activities.

New this summer at Keystone will be a June 29-July 3 Kidtopia event that will include live mountaintop music and free activities.

Summit County continues to see expanding economy with sale-tax revenue on the rise

#Summit County #Colorado

Summit Daily

Summit Daily Link

Wild growth continued across Summit County throughout February as each of the county's four biggest towns saw their economies expand to levels well above February 2017.

Even better news for the local economy is that while three out of four towns saw double-digit hikes compared to February 2017, Breckenridge, Frisco, Silverthorne and Dillon were all trending 8.2 percent to 23.1 percent ahead year to date, according to the most recent financial reports available.

"I keep saying (this high rate of growth is unsustainable), but then I turn around and report 10 percent growth again," noted Chad Most, revenue specialist for the town of Frisco.

Most said he expects it to slow down at some point, but apparently, February is not going to be that month. Also, he's expecting late-season snow to continue to boost the local economy coming into the summer months.

WHAT'S GOING ON IN DILLON?

Of Summit's four biggest towns, Dillon led the way for growth in February with estimated sales tax receipts jumping 15.3 percent compared to February 2017. That came after a blockbuster January that put Dillon up over 30 percent.

As a result, the town was 23.1 percent ahead through the first two months of the year.

As far as where this growth is occurring, "some of it truly is just a good, strong local economy," said Dillon finance director Carri McDonnell.

But she also credited booming business on Dillon Ridge — up almost 21.5 percent year to date — at the same time that the Ice Castle, a popular attraction running from Dec. 28 to March 10, drew large crowds to the downtown area.

As a result, McDonnell said, downtown sales through January and February were roughly 26 percent above where they were during the first two months of last year.

FAST TIMES IN FRISCO

After seeing 6.1 percent growth in January, Frisco was up 10.4 percent compared to February 2017, easily exceeding the town's best expectations for growth and helping put Frisco 8.2 percent ahead through the first two months of the year.

"We finally got some snow in February, so that was helpful," said Most, who has also noticed the stores off Interstate 70's exit 203 developing into a major hub for grocery, not just for Summit County locals but for travelers working their way across the I-70 corridor. "We weren't anticipating 10 percent, and that's good news for the business community for sure."

Carrying the load for that growth were the town's three most impactful sectors — restaurants (up 8.3 percent), general retail (up 7.5 percent) and grocery (up 4.8 percent) — that account for the bulk of Frisco's sales.

Less impactful categories like furnishings (36.9 percent), vacation rentals (24.3 percent), recreation (9.5 percent), marijuana (4.1 percent) and liquor (3.4 percent) were all up as well compared to February 2017.

Meanwhile, sectors such as clothing, hotels and inns and gifts saw their sales slow from 9-16 percent.

According to Most, "unsustainable levels of historic growth always seem to regress to the mean," but that hasn't happened yet.

IT'S BIGGER IN BRECK

In Breckenridge, the town is reporting estimated net taxable sales of $143 million through the first two months of 2018, which puts the town up 5.9 percent compared to February 2017 and 8.2 percent year to date.

Restaurants and bars (7.4 percent), construction (6 percent), retail (5.3 percent), and grocery and liquor (2.4 percent) saw growth in February. Additionally, lodging was up 8.3 percent, which town finance officials attribute to an increased number of monthly returns being filed.

The town's most impactful sectors are lodging, restaurants and bars, general retail, and grocery and liquor and all four were ahead year to date through the first two months of 2018.

Because Breckenridge has a retail tax base that exceeds a half-billion annually, the town sees much less dramatic spikes than others across Summit County.

DOUBLE DIGITS IN SILVERTHORNE

Like Dillon and Frisco, Silverthorne too saw double-digit economic growth in February compared to the same month in 2017 with estimated sales spiking 12.9 percent.

Year to date, Silverthorne was up 10.5 percent through the first two months of 2017, with the most significant increase showing up in the services category, which was up 330 percent compared to February 2017 and 156 percent year to date.

Silverthorne revenue administrator Kathy Marshall noted the sharp increase in the services category was due to "several months of amended returns" resulting in Silverthorne receiving a one-time payment of more than $120,000 in additional sales taxes.

"The vendor is being audited by the state, so if this payment was in error there may be a correction later in the year," she added.

Silverthorne's lodging posted the second-highest dollar increase for the town, jumping 11.8 percent compared to February 2017 and going 9.2 percent ahead year to date.

The outlets, which had a great January, were mostly flat this February, but there's reason for optimism on the horizon with new store openings in March and April and an ongoing mud season sale ending May 6.

Silverthorne did see declines in consumer retail (-9.2 percent), building retail (-7.8 percent) and auto (-5.6 percent), but gains in other sectors were more than enough to offset the losses in tax revenue for the town and, according to Marshall, the dips can all be attributed to corrections and "timing differences" in tax collections, rather than actual February sales.

In Denver, trying to put a price on the value of a newspaper

#Colorado

AP Photo

Summit Daily Link

Across the street from the Colorado Capitol rises an 11-story building emblazoned with The Denver Post's logo. No reporters work out of the building any more, only executives of Digital First Media, whose cuts at the Post triggered an unusual plea from the paper's own editorial page to be sold to another owner.

Five hundred miles to the west, the Salt Lake Tribune newsroom takes up one floor of the building that bears its name, overlooking snow-capped mountains and the arena where the Utah Jazz play. Once a Digital First property that dealt with staff reductions and feared closure, the paper was sold to a prominent local family in 2016. Since then, its reporters received their first raise in a decade and won a Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting.

Though its home city is less than one-third the size of Denver, the Tribune's newsroom staff of about 90 is larger than the Post's roughly 60, who work out of leased offices in an industrial area northeast of the city.

"Denver is such a big, vibrant community to have a staff that is smaller than ours — that's just a mockery," said Mike Gorrell, a veteran Tribune reporter.

As Colorado's civic community tries to mount a journalistic rescue mission and buy the Post, it is looking to Salt Lake City and other cities like Boston, Minneapolis and Philadelphia that have seen wealthy residents keep their newspapers viable. What happens in Denver could be a signal to a battered newspaper industry, reeling from dwindling ad revenues, of what the future looks like.

"You've got a better shot when there's a local owner — there's going to be pressure on that person to keep that asset vibrant," said former Denver Post editor Greg Moore, who contributed a column to the Post's April 9 editorial package. "If Denver's future was like Salt Lake's and they had a local owner with deep pockets who cared, that'd be the best outcome."

That was the hope of the Post's editorial page when it published its rebellious call for a sale with the headline: "As vultures circle, The Denver Post must be saved." Editorial Page Editor Chuck Plunkett did not inform the newspaper's editor or owners of the editorial and accompanying columns slamming Digital First and the New York-based Hedge Fund that owns it, Alden Global Capital, which the editorial called "vulture capitalists."

"The smart money is that in a few years The Denver Post will be rotting bones," the editorial warned.

Digital First and Alden did not reply to requests from The Associated Press for comment. The chain owns more than 80 newspapers and is known for cutting deeply. Critics say it vacuums up the profits from the reduced newsrooms and funnels them into other ventures.

In the days after the Post editorial, the editor of the Bay Area News Group, also owned by Digital First and reeling from heavy cuts, published a sympathetic column . Last week, the editorial page editor of the Boulder Daily Camera, another Digital First property, self-published his plea for a buyer, saying his bosses would not allow it in their newspaper.

It's unclear if the Post is even for sale, and there's no guarantee of a buyer surfacing in Denver.

Colorado's civic scene does not have a dominant family like the one in Utah who purchased the Tribune, the Huntsmans, which includes the recently deceased Jon Huntsman Sr., who founded an $11 billion industrial company. His son is Jon Huntsman Jr., the former governor of the state who is now the U.S. ambassador to Russia.

Colorado billionaire Phil Anschutz has long been rumored as a possible buyer, but he also owns the rights to the name of the shuttered Rocky Mountain News, and has explored reviving that paper in the past instead. Anschutz owns the Colorado Springs Gazette and has built a political vertical to compete with the Post's coverage.

Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper says he's been talking with local leaders about assembling possible buyers. Potential contributors include Colorado billionaires like John Malone, chairman of the board of Liberty Media, and Pat Stryker, a major liberal political donor. One group of philanthropists is traveling to Philadelphia to study how charities there bought the Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News in 2016, according to Bruce DeBoskey, a Denver philanthropic adviser.

The only group to surface publicly is a consortium in Colorado Springs that pledged $10 million toward purchase of the newspaper. "We still believe in print," said John Weiss, publisher of an alternative newspaper in Colorado Springs and six other small newspapers, who is part of the group.

J.B. Holston, dean of the University of Denver's school of engineering and computer science, has been convening meetings about the Post, but said some in the group lean toward starting a new, largely or entirely digital newsroom to bind the fast-growing city together.

But newspaper analyst Ken Doctor warned there's no proven substitute for a local newspaper.

"In this whole debacle of American journalism and especially with what Alden's done, we haven't seen anyone enter the scene with a real replacement," Doctor said.

Breckenridge Ski Resort closes 2017-18 season

#Breckenridge #Colorado

Summit Daily

Summit Daily Link

Breckenridge Ski Resort packed it up for the winter Sunday, closing out yet another ski and snowboard season with the always wacky, often inebriated, guaranteed-to-get-you-wet Breck Plunge.

For many, the last day of skiing is comparable to a last day of school. Happy in many ways, but bittersweet at the same time.

People were thoroughly enjoying themselves Sunday, getting one last chance to hit the slopes with a big party to boot. But there's also a tinge of blues, knowing these will be the last runs until the next go-round.

"Sadly so," said Ward Malek, who took home top honors at the plunge before agreeing there's really no better way to end a season. The 36-year-old ski instructor added that he'll be back next year and every year after that "until the day I die."

For the plunge, the resort put up a pond at the base of Peak 8. All the roughly 75 participants needed to do was sign up, pay the fee, dress the part and possess the necessary courage to attempt to skim the frigid water.

The best tip offered: the faster one goes, the more likely he or she is to reach the end. Regardless, taking the plunge remained a very high possibility, and while many did find reason to celebrate at the end, more failed than succeeded — depending, of course, on how one defines success.

Skimming the pond wasn't the only way to score points and win prizes because the resort also honored the participants with periphery awards, like best dressed and best plunge.

Dressed in a panda suit, Brian DeGryse had to hold his head on when he hit the jump coming into the pool. Like so many others, he didn't make it to the end, but soaked, he was a hit with the crowd and won best costume for his efforts.

Malek himself came as "Fast Eddie," a throwback of sorts, clad in flag-inspired attire, including a pair of shorts made to look like the Stars and Stripes and a tank top with whom else but Chuck Norris, firing two Uzis, no less.

Throughout the beginning of the 2017-18 season, as the state snowpack remained below normal, almost everyone was wanting. April was a gift, however, with more than 5 feet of snow falling on the resort during the last three weeks.

That was far from everyone's mind Sunday as clear skies helped temperatures shoot into the low-50s, and swimsuits were all too common, not just among the competitors, but in the crowd as well.

"What better way to close out than the Breck Plunge?" Zak Sos, a resort spokesman, asked rhetorically. "You have people and their zany costumes having a lot fun with live music. It's just a great party scene."

Attention has already turned to this summer, with Epic Discovery at Breckenridge Ski Resort expected to open June 8. Epic Passes are also now on sale for the 2018-19 ski season, Sos mentioned, as he encouraged people to act now to lock in the lowest price.

In Summit County, Keystone Ski Resort closed out its season two weeks ago while Copper Mountain Resort held its end-of-season festivities last weekend. Now, Arapahoe Basin Ski Area, which expects to close in June — along with nearby Loveland Ski Area, which goes until May — are the only two left running.

Media group from Kyrgyzstan film documentary in Summit County

#Summit County #Colorado

Summit Daily

Summit Daily Link

Kyrgyzstan is a landlocked, mountainous country in Central Asia that is farther from sea than any other country on the planet. The former Soviet satellite has come far since it became an independent nation after the fall of the USSR in 1991, but it still struggles with some everyday issues — like waste management — that Americans take for granted. In an effort to learn better strategies for waste and recycling, Kyrgyzstan's state-run Elkanaly TV station sent a three-person media contingent to tour and make an informational documentary about waste-management facilities across the U.S., including the Summit County Resource Allocation Park landfill near Keystone and Arapahoe Basin Ski Area's waste management facility.

The Kyrgyz group included translator and news announcer Aina Isakova, reporter Salabat Erkitaeva and cameraman Kainar Ormonov. The group traveled from the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek to the U.S. for two weeks, touring waste management facilities in New York, Washington, D.C., Boulder and Denver before arriving in Summit on Wednesday. The group spent much of their last half of the tour in Colorado because of its similarity to Kyrgyzstan in terms of climate and terrain.

"There are a lot of mountains in Kyrgyzstan," said Isakova, who also manages Elkanaly's International Affairs department. "It's like Colorado, it's also a mountainous place with a dry climate, some water and much snow."

The tour started out at Arapahoe Basin and its waste diversion system in the morning, followed by a bus tour around the SCRAP site in the afternoon. Aaron Byrne, SCRAP's solid waste director, led the tour and showed the Kyrgyz cohort how waste management worked in Summit. Byrne said that he learned about the lack of facilities in Kyrgyzstan during a roundtable discussion with the group.

"They have a lot of obstacles and challenges in Kyrgyzstan," Byrne said. "One of them is the lack of infrastructure in their country. This is all new to them, and they're really trying to find new concepts and new ways to do better recycling in their country."

As her partners hopped on and off the bus to film segments next to heavy machinery working on piles of glass bottles, wood chips and compost around the facility, Isakova explained that Kyrgyzstan had nothing like SCRAP or diversion systems like those at A-Basin.

"We're making this film for our government because we have really big problems with garbage," Isakova said. "We don't have any recycling centers, any composting, just landfills and nothing more. We are deeply impressed by what we've seen here. We've never seen such kind of recycling centers or facilities, because we have no such abilities to recycle back home."

Isakova explained that the very concept of sorting garbage was impressive to her group.

"We have no special bins for recycling or composting. We just drop our trash into one bin, and the state sanitation department just picks up our garbage throws it into the landfill. And the trash is just lying there, poisoning nature and people's health."

Assistant county manager Thad Noll was on hand for the tour, representing the county and explaining how the government put these processes into place. He said that the Kyrgyzs group was hoping to emulate Summit's model for waste management back home.

"At this moment, they're interested in this process and want to start to build a new recycling center there," Noll said. "But the problem is that they seem to be standing in one place. They know that they can't keep the system they have, which is taking their waste and putting it in a big hole. It's such a big problem they don't even know how to start tackling it."

Noll added that Summit's model appealed to the group as it was on a much smaller, yet efficient, scale suitable for their environment and resources.

"The scale SCRAP operates at is more appropriate for what they want to do than the Denver model that's got a multi-million dollar operation and is far more complex. What they need is basic, entry-level of recycling management."

Isakova said that the group's tour had been a fruitful one, and hoped it would provide inspiration for her government to seriously tackle their waste problem.

"We are really impressed," Isakova said, "and we are going to show our film to our government and hope they will take it into consideration, that they will learn something. We also hope to have a chance to invite someone from the U.S. to come and to Kyrgyzstan and teach us how to build these facilities and show us the right way to recycle, because it's a really big problem we're dealing with."

Dillon Amphitheatre million-dollar view now has the facility to match it

#Dillon #Colorado

Summit Daily

Summit Daily Link

With it's facelift set to be completed by early summer, the Dillon Amphitheatre will be ready to house bigger bands and greater crowds. They've announced an initial lineup — the biggest name on that list being Colorado jam band The String Cheese Incident on July 17 and 18. The announcement was one that excited and ignited the Summit County music scene and will likely put the Dillon Amphitheatre on the map as one of the best outdoor music venues in the state.

With views of the Tenmile and Gore ranges as its backdrop, the Dillon Amphitheatre was already a summertime favorite for locals, but with the recent improvements, the venue should be able to house bigger and better acts. The multi-million dollar upgrade began in the fall of 2017 and features a larger dance floor, new restrooms and a larger capacity with a couple hundred more seats for concertgoers.

"We didn't have the infrastructure we needed. We had no official green room, no loading or unloading space. When the NRO (National Repertory Orchestra) played we had to set their equipment cases behind the stage in the dirt. So, we tore it down, pushed it back closer to the reservoir, created bathrooms and green rooms for the bands," said Kerstin Anderson, director of marketing and communications for the town of Dillon.

The Amphitheatre's grass seating stayed the same — though the grade was softened — and is still in a bowl shape, curving around the stage. It's more ADA accessible, and there are now concession stands and a festival plaza at the top.

“ We are really looking to establish the Dillon Amphitheatre as one of the best outdoor facilities in the nation.”Kerstin AndersonTown of Dillon director of marketing and communications

"The festival plaza will have food trucks, local street vendors from the Summit County area. We envision a mixture of folks milling about and we will stage all of our food there," said Dillon's event manager, Matt Miano.

With these additions the venue is estimated to house an extra couple hundred visitors — roughly 3,650 people in total. Both Anderson and Miano said the updates should increase the enjoyment at the Amphitheatre, but that they still need to figure the new venue out.

"It will still be adjacent to the lake and the apartments. And it's still a really cool and intimate venue. It's not our goal to make it bigger, but to increase the flow of the facility," Miano said.

That flow is what attracted the Incident to Dillon.

"We reached out (to The String Cheese Incident) and included the plans of the new venue and the views, and they were just blown away by it," Anderson stated.

Bands don't know the Amphitheatre as a bucket-list venue — yet. The Dillon Amphitheatre could become the next Red Rocks-like space, but only time will tell as Dillon continues to understand the logistics of its new venue. Once they have a better understanding of its flow and capacity, it's likely more acts will be announced in the future.

"You got to trust us, we have good stuff in the works. There are many bands we are trying to nail down," Miano said.

Judging by how quickly The String Cheese Incident sold out, it seems locals are just fine with the lineup thus far.

"String Cheese opening up the new venue is huge. People are really excited about that," said Gary Koenig, owner of Affordable Music. "It sold out as quick as we could hand out tickets."

Tickets to The String Cheese Incident at Dillon Amphitheatre were initially sold online. And because of how rapidly the virtual tickets were sold, the town decided to sell roughly 250 more tickets for each night on Friday, March 16, at 11 a.m.

"There was a line of 100-plus people when we started selling at 11, and 10 (minutes) after noon they were all sold out," said Koenig. "There were just enough to satisfy everyone in line."

The tickets were gobbled up in an hour, showing the excitement for Summit County's local music scene.

"Having String Cheese shows what our venue can do," Anderson said.

The announcement of String Cheese is huge for the local scene, and a major introduction to what lies ahead for the burgeoning venue. The more bands the Amphitheatre brings, the more conversations will be sparked from one band to another.

For now, the town stresses that there will still be free shows and community events throughout the summer.

"If people think all the shows will be paid, that is not the case. We will still have free Friday and Saturday concerts and community programs, like movies on the water," Anderson said.

Holiday concerts are also in the works, such as a nighttime concert for the Fourth of July, featuring the U.S. Air Force Academy Band, which has played the venue before. Dillon is also excited to host a collaboration with the Colorado Symphony and the Wicked Divas.

This program features Elphaba and Glinda from the Broadway production "Wicked" and will showcase the depth of their high-flying talents. In addition to favorites from "Wicked," the program also includes highlights from "Gypsy," "Ragtime," "Titanic" and selections of "Carmen." Christopher Dragon will conduct this collaboration and Alli Mauzey and Nicole Parker will be vocalists. Unlike most shows at the Amphitheatre, this one on Sunday, July 29, will kick off at 6 p.m.

From String Cheese to Broadway show tunes, the Amphitheatre's lineup showcases the breadth of entertainment offerings. Keep an eye out for lineup additions by visiting TownOfDillon.com and looking under events. Renovations should be complete no later than the middle of June, giving the venue and its staff enough time to have a grasp of the changes.

"We are just thrilled to have a million-dollar facility to match our million-dollar views," said Anderson. "We are really looking to establish the Dillon Amphitheatre as one of the best outdoor facilities in the nation."