Ski patrollers and Park City Mountain Unions triumphantly returned to the slopes Thursday in Utah, after ending a nearly two-week strike over wages and benefits. The strike crippled the largest US ski resort during the busy holiday period and sparked anger online about deepening economic inequality in rural mountain areas.
Late Wednesday night, The Park City Professional Ski Patrollers Association Ratified a contract with Vail Resorts, which owns Park City and more than 40 other ski areas, raising the starting pay for ski patrollers and other mountain safety workers from $2 an hour to $23 an hour. The most experienced patrollers will receive an average raise of $7.75 per hour. The agreement also expands parental leave policies for workers and provides “industry-leading educational opportunities,” according to the union.
The ski patrollers were delighted. “This agreement is more than just a win for our team — it’s a groundbreaking breakthrough in the ski and mountain worker industry,” Seth Dromgull, lead negotiator and 17-year patroller for Park City, said in a statement. “This effort shows what can be achieved when workers stand together and fight for what they deserve.”
Bill Rock, president of Vail Resorts’ mountain division, said in a statement that the agreement “is consistent with our company’s wage structure for all patrollers, non-unionized and unionized, given Park City Mountain’s unique terrain and avalanche complexity.” “
Accusing Vail Resorts of unfair labor practices, the Ski Patrollers Association, which represents 204 ski patrollers and mountain safety personnel, went on strike on December 27. The strike received national attention as a battle between the haves and the have-nots — a global corporation worth nearly $10 billion against vital workers who help and protect skiers on its properties.
Only a quarter of Park City Mountain was open during the strike, with few ski patrollers to open trails, respond to accidents and mitigate avalanches.
Outraged skiers and snowboarders from Park City soon pilloried Vail, taking to social media and national news organizations to decry long lift lines and contrast expensive ticket prices with the high salaries of Vail leadership and the relatively low pay of resort workers.
“Vail Resorts destroys skiing, ski towns and ski culture everywhere they go,” one person wrote. Instagram.
“We apologize to our guests who were affected by this strike and are incredibly grateful to our team who worked so hard over the past two weeks to keep the mountain open and operating safely,” said Mr. Rock of Vail Resorts.
The strike also highlights the role of patrollers – and the risks they take – in managing a major ski area. Generally, professional ski patrollers must obtain emergency medical worker certifications and receive training in avalanche mitigation and search and rescue. They are required to ski challenging terrain, and are expected to successfully maneuver a heavy toboggan loaded with injured skiers. Snow safety employees, who are also unionized, ski into avalanche terrain and throw explosives to trigger avalanches to ensure the safety of guests.
The strike also highlighted a problematic issue increasingly seen in many tourism-supported rural mountain communities: the rising cost of living. In Park City, a town of about 8,400 people, the cost of living is 33 percent higher than the national average, according to the Institute for Economic Research. Some estimates are much higher. The median price for a new home in Park City is about $2 million, according to realtor.com, and higher 70 percent of the houses are empty or used as a second home. The Park City Ski Patrol union says the living wage in Park City is $27 an hour, much higher than the newly won $23 starting wage for ski patrollers.
During the strike, Park City’s ski patrollers raised more than $300,000 in a GoFundMe fund, with more than 4,000 people contributing, drawing widespread support from the public.
From 2021, The number of ski area workers in the United States, mostly ski patrollers and lift operators, has nearly doubled since joining the union.According to Ski Area Management, a trade journal. United Mountain WorkersPart of the Communications Workers of America, now represents about 1,100 ski industry employees in 16 bargaining units in four western states, 13 of which represent ski patrollers, including Park City employees.
At other resorts around the country, ski patrollers were buoyed by the strike’s success.
Ryan Anderson, vice president of the Vail-owned Ski Patrol union Breckenridge Ski Resort In Colorado, said the outcome in Utah could be a step toward ending what it called “extractivism in our mountain towns.”
“I hope this strike has the effect of announcing that these communities should be taken as serious partners in successful enterprises rather than as a source of exploitable labour,” he said.
John Jamieson, a second-year Park City ski patroller, described the resolution as “very emotional, with a lot of tears.”
“It’s a bunch of regular, time-clock-punching people sitting at the table with this huge corporation and coming forward,” he said. “It would be really nice to think that this is a tipping point.”
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