Eldora Mountain Resort has withdrawn its objections to the vote by ski area patrollers in April that approved union representation.
Eldora, which is owned by Powdr, originally objected to the vote because not all volunteer ski patrollers were included. The resort’s patrollers in April voted 29-3 to join the United Professional Ski Patrols of America union, which has grown in recent years as a wave of ski patrollers and lift mechanics unionize in hopes that collective bargaining will improve pay and benefits for workers in pricey mountain communities.
In a letter to ski patrollers, Eldora president and general manager Brent Tregaskis last week said he hopes the withdrawal of the election objections marks a move toward “good faith” bargaining over a new patrol contract.
“You represent a critical part of our resort operations, and we are committed to providing everyone who wears an Eldora uniform a fair, supportive and collaborative work environment,” Tregaskis wrote.
Pro-union patrollers at Eldora Mountain Resort eyed the move warily.
“If they’re genuine about ‘good faith’ negotiations, it would be a positive step, but we’ve heard all sorts of things from management at this point and can’t count on any of it,” said Nick Lansing, a four-year patroller at Eldora who hopes collective bargaining can improve pay and health care benefits for patrollers at the Boulder County ski area.
As patrollers and the ski area prepared to argue their cases before the National Labor Relations Board, Lansing said the resort’s managers asked ski patrollers to delete an Instagram video post that described “the harsh realities” of their job, which includes the lack of a bathroom at patrol headquarters. Lansing said the managers also asked patrollers to withdraw their formal objections to the National Labor Relations Board’s decision to allow volunteer patrollers in the vote.
The Eldora patrollers declined, Lansing said.
“What would truly be a show of good faith would be if they gave the pro-union patrollers — whose rehire status they’ve withheld — a written positive rehire status, which is standard for end-of-season exit interviews,” said Lansing, who said managers told him he and other patrollers violated resort employee rules by making disparaging comments about the company in the video. “Several of our jobs are in jeopardy, myself included, so it’s hard to take an offer of good faith at its word.”
The Instagram video — liked by more than 4,400 users — illuminates the growing role of social media among patrollers seeking to unionize. Patrollers across the West are finding widespread support — from locals and the larger ski community — through online social media posts.
“It’s a really strong tool that ski industry employees have right now,” said Lansing, noting that Eldora ski patrollers launched a campaign asking Eldora skiers to write letters to managers at Eldora and its parent Powdr in support of the union effort. “I bet 100 people wrote letters. It feels really good to see every corner of our community behind us and willing to support us.”
In a letter to Isabel Aries with the Communication Workers of America, Local 7781, Tregaskis said the resort’s administrators “stand by the underlying merit” of the objections, but “we are withdrawing its opposition “to focus on what is important: our patrollers.”
“We are a family at Eldora that will always support one another through the good times, tough times, and despite any differences,” Tregaskis wrote to Aries.
Lansing said patrollers suspect the withdrawn objection has more to do with saving legal costs “to argue challenges that were shaky at best with no actual show of commitment to the team that flew 10 patients in choppers this season and kept the mountain free of fatalities for the first time in years.
“I am not exactly heartened by this decision,” he said.