It snowed about seven inches overnight at Eldora Mountain Resort, about 40 minutes outside of Boulder, and in the morning, the flakes are still falling. Rebecca Burns is preparing to hike up on her skis before the lifts start spinning.
“It's been kind of a dry winter, but we’ve had some good snow the last few days and hopefully some more,” she said. “So yeah, it should be a good day.”
Like on most winter weekend days, the parking lot is near-full. Eager CU Boulder students pour out of a bus and families gear up for ski lessons. Burns said, despite the bustle, the small resort maintains a local feel. Many Front Range residents come here to escape heavy I-70 traffic.
But the future of the beloved hill is uncertain. The company that owns it, Utah-based POWDR, is putting it up for sale. Burns, who works for a local education nonprofit, has one wish.
“As long as it's not bought by Vail, that’s all I really care about,” she said. “Like a posh, ‘pinkies-out’ mountain — that's not what the locals want around here.”
Vail Resorts, also based in Colorado, has gobbled up dozens of ski resorts in the past two decades and now owns more than 40. Along with rival, Alterra Mountain Company, Vail has become the face of a new era in skiing, marked by consolidation, mega-passes and large crowds. Vail and Alterra didn’t respond to questions about whether they’re interested in Eldora. There could be other companies in the running.
However, there’s another, much different buyer raising its hand: Nederland, the neighboring town, just down the hill.
“Members of our board started asking the question, ‘What if?'” said Jonathan Cain, the administrator for the town of 1,500, while sitting at his desk in Nederland’s historic 1874 town hall.
Keeping skiing accessible
Known for its quirky character, Nederland once held a festival dedicated to a long-dead man kept cryogenically frozen in a back shed, aptly titled “Frozen Dead Guy Days.” A former mining hub, it was revived by musicians and artists during the counterculture movement of the 1960s and 70s.
“It's always been a place that's been just a little bit different and marches to the beat of its own drummer,” Cain said.
Now, as a gateway to outdoor recreation, local leaders think buying the nearby resort could give the town control over one of its main economic drivers.
“How do we retain those legacies of what skiing has always been in Colorado, and make sure it's accessible and affordable for the next generation?” Cain said.
The town's bid to purchase Eldora is considered by some to be a long shot; the estimated its price tag is between $100 million and $200 million. But current resort management said the business is profitable, and Cain sees a big opportunity.
“It is really important to the people of Nederland that this remains a real community, where real people live, and they raise their kids, and they can work and play in the same places,” he said. “I think it ultimately will help us keep Nederland, Nederland.”
Running a ski mountain isn’t easy. There are big-ticket expenses like chairlift maintenance and the uncertainty of snowfall with climate change. Cain, a former ski patroller at a nearby mountain himself, understands the challenges and said experts would be in charge.
The town is looking into the financial feasibility of the arrangement, but it's been invited to submit a final bid.
A mountain that runs a little differently
Working behind the counter in a downtown pizza shop, Steve Trujillo said he’s skeptical of the town taking over the resort. He doesn't think it will have enough funds to make improvements at Eldora.
“We don’t have the money to have a police station,” he exclaimed. “We don’t have money to have a bank; we don’t have money for good sidewalks, for good roads. How do we have the money to buy a ski area?”
But Cain said the town can swing the purchase despite its tiny tax base. The working idea is that Nederland would buy the mountain through municipal bonds sold on the open market, with potential help from local investors or grants to offset the cost.
The resort would be managed like a self-contained business, and the bonds would be repaid with revenue from Eldora. Cain explained it’s similar to how cities run wastewater treatment plants or build airports.
Any leftover ski revenue, he said, could be funneled into local projects, like fixing sidewalks or improving infrastructure. The town could build affordable housing for employees, offer childcare and possibly even explore discounted lift tickets for residents.
“Our dream is just a mountain that runs a little bit differently,” Cain said.
When Michael Childers first heard about Nederland’s pitch, he said it sounded romantic, if a stretch for the small town. It reminded him of his childhood growing up skiing at mom-and-pop hills in Colorado. Childers, a professor at Colorado State University, wrote a book about the history of the ski industry in the state.
While small, independent resorts still scatter the West, he said, ownership trends are moving in the opposite direction. He said the push to buy Eldora could be part of a wider reaction against those forces. Local investors bought Killington in Vermont over the summer and locals are pooling resources to try to buy Oregon’s Mt. Bachelor. Both were also listed for sale by POWDR at the same time as Eldora.
“The ski area really controls a lot of the industry, a lot of the culture of these places,” Childers said. “So, I see this as a reaction against that kind of corporate, mega-resort ownership.”
Nederland hopes that buying Eldora could serve as a model for other mountain communities pondering their futures as outdoor recreation hubs. But first, the town needs to make an offer.
This story was produced by the Mountain West News Bureau, a collaboration between Wyoming Public Media, Nevada Public Radio, Boise State Public Radio in Idaho, KUNR in Nevada, KUNC in Colorado and KANW in New Mexico, with support from affiliate stations across the region. Funding for the Mountain West News Bureau is provided in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
