Light snow continues to fall at Killington building up the base.

Light snow continues to fall at Killington building up the base.

Life has a habit of catching up to you; and this week for us has been no exception. Nothing major, just some flotsam and jetsam of living in a ski resort, in a small town, with snow constantly falling in the background. I was spoiled the last couple of weeks, being able to get on skis on the mountain 4 days each week. So far, not this week.

Did you "Do the Dew" last week? I though the Killington Resort came across on NBC TV very well. The local population of Killington is now going through a gnashing of teeth process trying to figure out if the event was "profitable" for the region. They are also trying to figure out what is the "future value" created by international television exposure. Both of these items, as any marketing person with any experience will tell you, are intractable numbers to derive with any accuracy, especially where the revenue stream created by the event and exposure is spread out across hundreds of businesses. But estimates and guesses will be made.

I accept that it was a good event for Killington. The national/international exposure is but one step in the rebuilding of the Killington Resorts reputation as the Beast of the East. It can't be viewed as a single point, but part of a dynamic process to bring glory and honor to the great ski resort many of us love.

(For the record, our bookings last week for lodging were up 50% from last year. Last year, of course, we were in the depths of an economic meltdown. This year, we are in a nascent economic recovery. The bookings increase brought our lodging occupancy for the week up to traditional levels, versus last years economically depressed situation. Were the bookings increase because of "The Dew" or because people want to ski again and can afford to visit Killington? It does not really matter. People visited Killington and had a great time. That's what we "Do".)

The "Dew" dynamic is but a subset of living in a small ski resort town. Yesterday I was asked by multiple people to attend last nights select board meeting. It was a warm up for the Town Meeting in March. Town budgets for the EDTC, the Green Mountain National Golf Course, and the General Budget were discussed and voted on by the Select board to allow them to be published in the upcoming town report.

It was an interesting meeting. The new found civility being reported by the press concerning national politics sadly has not filtered down to the local level quite yet. Killington, like many small towns in the country, has some financial problems that need to be resolved. Looming large among them is the debt service for the Green Mountain National Golf Course. The problem did not create itself overnight; it has been known for years; the current select board and golf course staff were not responsible for originating the problem; everyone agrees the problem needs to be solved; yet I think some people just like the attention of the argument, versus fixing the problem. It's really too bad and very negative, especially in contrast to the positive experiences created days earlier with the "Dew Tour" activities.

Several possibilities exist for clearing the golf course debt. The all will revolve around acquiring some financing mechanism to term some or all of the debt out. The tricky part becomes paying for it. Battle lines are being drawn between adding the payments to the town tax rolls, thereby increasing the local property tax rate, or diverting some of the money set aside for the Economic Development and Tourism Commission (EDTC) to pay off the debt. The next 6 weeks leading up to Town Meeting should be interesting.

Around the inn this week, there are several other pieces of flotsam and jetsam bobbing about. There is the ongoing issue with a snow blower being repaired. At some point I will write more about it, but I am trying to be civil. We also have an item coming up later in the week with our television service provided by Comcast. For years, Comcast has been telling us that they cannot provide digital TV service to the inn for this or that reason. Miraculously, all of a sudden they can. Not only that, by the middle of February they must! Comcast cable boxes are now scheduled to be installed in each room on Thursday of this week. What service they will provide, who knows? That no doubt will be fodder for another post.

I hope to get back out on the mountain tomorrow to try out this weeks fresh snow. In the meantime.....Let it snow!