Sunshine ski resort owner gets unfair offer he can't refuse from feds

[Xtrema]

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The world is ending in 12 years because of climate change anyway so why worry past that.

ROI, that means you don't have 42 years to make all your $.

Reading Herald is like reading Calgary Sun now.

[Rocket1k78]

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What a dumb article and a dumb comparison.

This person is renting with the INTENT OF TURNING A PROFIT. Of course the renters will upgrade where necessary for the next 1/2 century, in order to keep business going. Kick the can down the road.

This is not a 10 year plan, its 42 fucking years - after which, anything is possible. Perhaps we will be skiing on Mars by then.

Agreed. So buddy built the business on land he didnt own and now hes getting mad because the new lease is only for 42 more years?!?!

[Sentry]

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42 years is a long time and all kinds of stupid things can happen in the meantime. I don't think this is anything to get ruffled about.

It's longer than the entire time Race City was open (25ish years), so it's really hard for me to give a fuck about skiiers losing their playground due to the same-ish circumstance in the distant future.

[sexualbanana]

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Boo-frickety-hoo sunshine (and why is an Opinion piece being put as Local News?),

My first thought was the editorial tone. Short of calling Prime Minister Trudeau any names, the anti-Liberal party biases couldn't be more obvious. That bias also leads me to believe there's more to the story than just what's written or what Scurfield says.

[sexualbanana]

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You mean, an article written by the Government media outlet to make the Government look much better.

As opposed to a clearly biased editorial that, for some reason, is being interpreted as objective journalism?

[JRSC00LUDE]

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As opposed to a clearly biased editorial that, for some reason, is being interpreted as objective journalism?

One's on either side of the equation and both are skewed I'm sure. Calling either accurate would be a stretch.

[sexualbanana]

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One's on either side of the equation and both are skewed I'm sure. Calling either accurate would be a stretch.

Not that I don't entirely disagree, but I'd argue that the CBC's article is more objective than the Herald's, which is ultimately just calling people names.

[mr2mike]

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42 years is a long time and all kinds of stupid things can happen in the meantime. I don't think this is anything to get ruffled about.

Find some old arrow heads on the ski hill and the place will be closed the next day. So 42 yrs is a good deal.

[Darell_n]

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Find some old arrow heads on the ski hill and the place will be closed the next day. So 42 yrs is a good deal.

Maybe. We know that cutting down a swath of endangered trees won't do it.

[speedog]

So what of the ski hill at Lake Louise or Norquay, both of them are in the park as well - will they be facing the same situation?

[HiTempguy1]

Man, my head is spinning when people say the CALGARY HERALD is anti-liberal, or comparable to the Sun

My main question is, why is the lease ending? Is the government building something there? Are we just not allowed to have a ski hill? If so, that is utter bullshit and federal overreach. We're not going to have any land left to live on besides the current footprints of all the towns and cities at the rate the feds and province are deeming land "protected". Want to enjoy the outdoors? Only if you are walking!

[Tik-Tok]

Lease is up in 2020, every other ski hill has the new "site guidelines" in place already.

https://www.talkwithparks.ca/sunshine

[sexualbanana]

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So what of the ski hill at Lake Louise or Norquay, both of them are in the park as well - will they be facing the same situation?

I think it ultimately comes down to Scurfield contesting the proposed site guidelines for Sunshine Village which raises the cap on visitors from 6,000 to to 8,500, but reduces their land plot by 15% in the name of ecological integrity and wildlife protection (as cited in the CBC article). Also stated in the article is that Lake Louise and Norquay are the have already agreed on site guidelines with Parks Canada, and that Lake Louise is the only ski resort that hasn't yet.

It appears to me that Sunshine Village is embarking on a PR campaign to sway public opinion by playing the role of a victim being bullied by Parks Canada, led by a Trudeau-appointed chief executive of Parks Canada. It's not exactly difficult in Alberta to convince people that the Liberal federal government is the enemy.

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Man, my head is spinning when people say the CALGARY HERALD is anti-liberal, or comparable to the Sun

My main question is, why is the lease ending? Is the government building something there? Are we just not allowed to have a ski hill?

Because leases typically have set lengths? I don't know of any private business that has an indefinite lease on any parcel of land, though I could be wrong.

[HiTempguy1]

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Because leases typically have set lengths? I don't know of any private business that has an indefinite lease on any parcel of land, though I could be wrong.

Tough to tell whether you are being purposefully obtuse or not. The lease has been offered, AGAIN, but only for 42 years and with no money given to the resort at the end to compensate them for the capital sunk into the resort and no way to get any money for it.

There clearly won't be a ski hill there after the 42 years. Why? Its either a ski hill or nothing. So clearly a decision has been made to return that to national park land. Again, why?

Edit-
Oh, never mind, I didn't read the first part of your post, I see you are being purposefully obtuse. No shit leases have end dates, usually leases are continued especially when it comes to land development, in case it needs to be spelled out for you.

[Brent.ff]

Only 42 years? That seems like a hell of a long time for a lease on PUBLIC land to me..

[89coupe]

$700/year at Nakiska for an entire family, ski as much as you want, such a great deal.

[sexualbanana]

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Tough to tell whether you are being purposefully obtuse or not. The lease has been offered, AGAIN, but only for 42 years and with no money given to the resort at the end to compensate them for the capital sunk into the resort and no way to get any money for it.

There clearly won't be a ski hill there after the 42 years. Why? Its either a ski hill or nothing. So clearly a decision has been made to return that to national park land. Again, why?

Edit-
Oh, never mind, I didn't read the first part of your post, I see you are being purposefully obtuse. No shit leases have end dates, usually leases are continued especially when it comes to land development, in case it needs to be spelled out for you.

Assuming their lease had expired, or is coming up on expiration, the Scurfields have operated Sunshine since 1981. Wouldn't that mean that the current lease has been about 38 years in length?

As many have said, 42 years is plenty of time. Also, I'd imagine that any infrastructure improvements will have depreciated completely in that timespan, so from an accounting perspective, those assets would have little or no value by the end of that lease anyways. At least, according to my dated understanding of accounting concepts.

But like I said, if all leases have end dates, is there anything precluding a potential renewal of the lease 40 years down the line? I haven't seen anything that says otherwise.

[dubhead]

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It appears to me that Sunshine Village is embarking on a PR campaign to sway public opinion by playing the role of a victim being bullied by Parks Canada, led by a Trudeau-appointed chief executive of Parks Canada. It's not exactly difficult in Alberta to convince people that the Liberal federal government is the enemy.



Because leases typically have set lengths? I don't know of any private business that has an indefinite lease on any parcel of land, though I could be wrong.

The Scurfield's have been on a PR campaign playing the victim for a few years now. It started with talk around future parking plans and parking on the access road. This really ramped up when parks went to limit access road parking after they knocked a bigger avalanche onto the road then they ever had before. Parks had a legitimate safety reason to close parking on the access road and Sunshine turned to social media claiming parks was unfairly targeting them. I've been following this all for a few years and it seems at every turn parks as tried to work with Sunshine but they would rather bitch, moan, and claim parks is being unreasonable then actually come to mutual beneficial agreements. At this point I believe Parks is sick of their shit and Sunshine is going to end up with what ever parks wants to give them.

[googe]

Man that's painful to read straight from the first sentence. They don't even pretend to be unbiased. The dishonest PR campaign from the Sunshine owners makes me doubt their side.

Nearly all US resorts are on national forest land, many of which have expansion limitations or highways. When the lots are full, which happens often around here, cars get turned around and sent home. Anyone who parks on the road gets ticketed and towed. More revenue for the park!

If building a parking structure isn't feasible (and that does seem like a dumb idea to be honest), it seems like that's an easy solution to this problem? Not clear from the garbage article if this is on the table, and if not, who is opposing it.

And yeah, most resorts in North America are on leased land. That's the nature of this business. So the sob story about landlords fixing the roof is pretty absurd.

Edit:

Reading the government's version seems to paint a very different story:

https://www.talkwithparks.ca/sunshine

In short, the real story seems to be:

Sunshine owner is allowed to increase capacity with new runs and new lifts, expanding terrain, and supporting up to 8500 visitors, but if he chooses to do so, he has to either build parking to support it, or provide transit options.

or

Sunshine owner doesn't get to build new lifts or expand terrain, and is capped at 6500 visitors

Edit 2:

Parking Fact Sheet:

https://www.talkwithparks.ca/5548/documents/10816

Sunshine owner wants the government to allow development of currently undeveloped land (not even within his lease permit area, wtf) so he can build more parking lots. They say no. He's spinning this as though they are forcing him to build a parking structure. That's not the case. They gave him some options, one of which is a parking structure within his existing footprint, another of which is don't expand capacity, stay where you are, and there is another area that they offered for development, but he feels won't be enough.

The draft Site Guidelines allow Sunshine to increase its parking within the leased area through a terrace along the north edge of the current parking lot and/or through construction of a parking structure. Sunshine believes this is insufficient for its future needs and has proposed an expansion of the main lot over and above what is described in the Site Guidelines, and the development of a number of satellite parking lots along or at the bottom of the Access road. (see map and Table below ). These proposals involve the use of additional, undisturbed national park land for development.

From everything they have posted, it looks like they are being pretty transparent and reasonable and trying to work with the guy. He looks like a whiner who doesn't want to follow the rules so he's trying to work up some outrage and make this out to be Team Trudeau bullying Alberta. I hope Albertans are not that gullible.

Edit 3:

https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/.../FullText.html

It's illegal to lease out National Park land for more than 42 years at a time. They aren't making him give it back 42 years from now. They negotiate a new lease at that time, as it has always been, for everyone operating in a national park. Everyone who owns a house in Banff is on a 42 year lease term. Renewal is basically a formality. But that's how national parks work. Imagine every home owner or shop owner in Banff saying that the government should pay for their buildings

They aren't threatening to take it away now either. His lease is up, and he has to sign a new one. If he doesn't sign a new lease, he obviously has to leave. Duh.

[Brent.ff]

Listening to them cry on CBC this morning made it just so much better.. took David gray twice to get it out of them that they dont actually own the land..