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A rural ski slope caught up in an international scam

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Re: A rural ski slope caught up in an international scam

#11

Post by iamthepieman »

reducesuffering wrote: post #8
iamthepieman wrote: post #5

I live and ski in this area[0]. Have season's passes to Burke Mountain and even met Stenger and Quiros back when they were running the ski areas. On the slopes, at my coworking space, and around the campfire in the Summer, the topic of how to make this little pocket of Northeast Vermont more economically viable is a topic that comes up often. I'm starting to form an opinion that we shouldn't try to compete, at any le…

> On the slopes, at my coworking space, and around the campfire in the Summer Your answer is pretty much right there. Make the ski resort into a world-class apres-ski destination that many people would love to live around that environment or visit on the weekends from the Montreal metro of 4.3m or Boston CSA of 8.5m people. Then you'll have the second-order effects of buses, coworking places, cafes, restaurants, and…

We've kind of got that already. It's not world class but it is quite nice. We do have world-class competition at Stowe and Killington though so not sure how well we could compete.

I really do think that the bigger issue is the housing. That and NIMBYism. We have the Wildflower Inn nearby that I used to vacation at with my family when I was a kid. It was run by a family for 40 years before it was sold a few years ago to a guy who had fallen in love with the area. I've ridden the lift with him a few times and chatted about all the problems he had trying to get approval for his development ideas.

The original owners did some beef farming on the land around the Inn. The new owner wanted to take the old barns and pastures and build a bunch of vacation cabins and camping spots with shared public spaces. The area was set back and not visible from the road. It would have been visible from the mountain biking trails but that's it. He got so much push back from the town and locals that he canceled the project.

Of course, he could just subdivide into the minimum rural 3 acre lots and the town could do nothing about it and then we'd have 40 individual driveways and large houses obstructing the view instead.

Re: A rural ski slope caught up in an international scam

#12

Post by hobs »

threeseed wrote: post #9
ryandrake wrote: post #7

> The whole program, it turned out, lent itself to dishonesty. Faraway investors were desperate to get to the U.S., and didn’t keep close track of where their money was going. The lawyers and brokers got large transaction fees and had little incentive to point out potential wrongdoing. “Everybody was making millions of dollars, but very few people wanted to speak the truth about the riskiness of these investments,” G…

Usually the government is fully aware of the risks of fraud. But that the cost of not implementing the program is far worse. Which in the case of PPP would've meant a lot of businesses failing and workers without a job.

And that's worse than poor people not being able to eat how? It's the same excuse trotted out time and again, but the only beneficiaries that actually exist are people anyway, so it makes no sense (unless you think rich people are more deserving than poor people.)

Re: A rural ski slope caught up in an international scam

#13

Post by Analemma_ »

hobs wrote: post #12
threeseed wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Usually the government is fully aware of the risks of fraud. But that the cost of not implementing the program is far worse. Which in the case of PPP would've meant a lot of businesses failing and workers without a job.

And that's worse than poor people not being able to eat how? It's the same excuse trotted out time and again, but the only beneficiaries that actually exist are people anyway, so it makes no sense (unless you think rich people are more deserving than poor people.)

When pressed, most of the people who support strict means testing for welfare will eventually admit that it's not about saving the government money, and that they support it even if it ends up costing taxpayers on net (which it almost always does). They're pretty clear that this is about punishing indigence.

Re: A rural ski slope caught up in an international scam

#14

Post by lmm »

hobs wrote: post #12
threeseed wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Usually the government is fully aware of the risks of fraud. But that the cost of not implementing the program is far worse. Which in the case of PPP would've meant a lot of businesses failing and workers without a job.

And that's worse than poor people not being able to eat how? It's the same excuse trotted out time and again, but the only beneficiaries that actually exist are people anyway, so it makes no sense (unless you think rich people are more deserving than poor people.)

> And that's worse than poor people not being able to eat how?

Food programs are pretty widely supported. People don't want poor people not being able to eat, they want poor people not being able to drink alcohol/do drugs/play videogames/watch movies/..., the things they see as a fun indulgence.

Re: A rural ski slope caught up in an international scam

#15

Post by jhfdbkofdchk »

ryandrake wrote: post #7

> The whole program, it turned out, lent itself to dishonesty. Faraway investors were desperate to get to the U.S., and didn’t keep close track of where their money was going. The lawyers and brokers got large transaction fees and had little incentive to point out potential wrongdoing. “Everybody was making millions of dollars, but very few people wanted to speak the truth about the riskiness of these investments,” G…

I'm not going to argue with your central point that we spend too much time scrutinizing small dollar awards. The PPP program was ridiculous. I had a very difficult time helping two legit non-profits (one a nursery school, one a food pantry) get a fraction of the money they were entitled to under the PPP program, while less scrupulous people got far more.

In the EB-5 real-estate investment program, the government doesn't hand out money here. If you're a rich overseas individual who wants to relocate to the US, you can invest like $1-2m (used to be lower), and boom you're in.

Re: A rural ski slope caught up in an international scam

#16

Post by atourgates »

iamthepieman wrote: post #5

I live and ski in this area[0]. Have season's passes to Burke Mountain and even met Stenger and Quiros back when they were running the ski areas. On the slopes, at my coworking space, and around the campfire in the Summer, the topic of how to make this little pocket of Northeast Vermont more economically viable is a topic that comes up often. I'm starting to form an opinion that we shouldn't try to compete, at any le…

One of the things I have trouble understanding is why "rural mountain towns near large population centers" are exploding in the West, but not the East.

I understand some of the issues. The mountains are smaller and the snow isn't nearly as consistent.

But still. It seems like a ski resort 3.5 hours from Boston should be absolutely brimming with customers every long weekend.

On the other hand, I sat in a hot tub with a New Yorker at a Salt Lake City ski resort who claimed that it was quicker and easier for him to get there, than to Vermont ski hills.

I don't think the math quite adds up (The drive from NYC to Jay is going to be 6.5 hours, but you could fly from JFK to Burlington in 1hr 20min, and drive another 1hr 20min to Jay, vs a 4hr flight and 1hr drive to Park City, UT) - but I get the point.

Re: A rural ski slope caught up in an international scam

#17

Post by ok_computer »

reducesuffering wrote: post #8
iamthepieman wrote: post #5

I live and ski in this area[0]. Have season's passes to Burke Mountain and even met Stenger and Quiros back when they were running the ski areas. On the slopes, at my coworking space, and around the campfire in the Summer, the topic of how to make this little pocket of Northeast Vermont more economically viable is a topic that comes up often. I'm starting to form an opinion that we shouldn't try to compete, at any le…

> On the slopes, at my coworking space, and around the campfire in the Summer Your answer is pretty much right there. Make the ski resort into a world-class apres-ski destination that many people would love to live around that environment or visit on the weekends from the Montreal metro of 4.3m or Boston CSA of 8.5m people. Then you'll have the second-order effects of buses, coworking places, cafes, restaurants, and…

That’s what’s awesome about Jay peak tho in VT. If you want gaudy corporate attractions ski town then go to Stowe. There’s plenty of west coast and rocky mountain ski town targets too for that type of bland investment and redevelopment. Jay peak is awesome how it is as a low key border community. There was a corner store there that sold milk to the Canadians at CAD parity to USD around 2018.

Not every town needs to become a tech hub. And VT basically locked itself in a time capsule by their regulations on development ensuring that the only land owners are wealthy people who can afford to buy large areas of farmland. Also the environmental aspirations of the state don’t support a population boom. They don’t have new landfills and restrictive waste policies that keeps the place awesome now but is not universally economically achievable with larger population centers.

Re: A rural ski slope caught up in an international scam

#18

Post by duxup »

ryandrake wrote: post #7

> The whole program, it turned out, lent itself to dishonesty. Faraway investors were desperate to get to the U.S., and didn’t keep close track of where their money was going. The lawyers and brokers got large transaction fees and had little incentive to point out potential wrongdoing. “Everybody was making millions of dollars, but very few people wanted to speak the truth about the riskiness of these investments,” G…

And poor people actually pump that money into the economy, they’re very effective at it.

Re: A rural ski slope caught up in an international scam

#19

Post by iamthepieman »

atourgates wrote: post #16
iamthepieman wrote: post #5

I live and ski in this area[0]. Have season's passes to Burke Mountain and even met Stenger and Quiros back when they were running the ski areas. On the slopes, at my coworking space, and around the campfire in the Summer, the topic of how to make this little pocket of Northeast Vermont more economically viable is a topic that comes up often. I'm starting to form an opinion that we shouldn't try to compete, at any le…

One of the things I have trouble understanding is why "rural mountain towns near large population centers" are exploding in the West, but not the East. I understand some of the issues. The mountains are smaller and the snow isn't nearly as consistent. But still. It seems like a ski resort 3.5 hours from Boston should be absolutely brimming with customers every long weekend. On the other hand, I sat in a hot tub with…

This is happening at the big Vermont ski resorts like Stowe and Killington. Stowe might as well be a suburb of Boston, New York and Quebec.

No one around here can figure it out either. I sit next to a guy at my coworking space who works on rural economic development. Just today he was putting together a report on some funding that was given to promote small businesses. He said they were supposed to present the report to the board but the program had done so poorly that they were just going to file the report and never bring it up again.

Re: A rural ski slope caught up in an international scam

#20

Post by meandthewallaby »

atourgates wrote: post #16
iamthepieman wrote: post #5

I live and ski in this area[0]. Have season's passes to Burke Mountain and even met Stenger and Quiros back when they were running the ski areas. On the slopes, at my coworking space, and around the campfire in the Summer, the topic of how to make this little pocket of Northeast Vermont more economically viable is a topic that comes up often. I'm starting to form an opinion that we shouldn't try to compete, at any le…

One of the things I have trouble understanding is why "rural mountain towns near large population centers" are exploding in the West, but not the East. I understand some of the issues. The mountains are smaller and the snow isn't nearly as consistent. But still. It seems like a ski resort 3.5 hours from Boston should be absolutely brimming with customers every long weekend. On the other hand, I sat in a hot tub with…

I'm a fellow Kingdom resident -- there are plenty of ski hills between here and Boston. The ones closer get more play. Stowe is a bigger resort, and it gets more play. Less so between here and Montreal, but there's ski hills north of Montreal that are closer. A place like Littleton, just beyond Cannon Mountain, _is_ brimming with customers every long weekend. Jay (and Burke, which is _really_ a locals' mountain) are very much in the in-between.
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