September 20, 2006

Proposed ski expansion panel plagued by division

By Vickie Aldous

Ashland Daily Tidings

The Ashland City Council is hoping opponents will work together to help oversee the Mt. Ashland Ski & Snowboard Resort expansion.

But whether or not the opposite sides will even join the effort remains uncertain.

On Tuesday night, a council majority voted to ask two environmental group members, two Mt. Ashland Association staff or board members, a U.S. Forest Service employee and two city councilors to join Ashland Public Works Director Paula Brown on an advisory panel.

Councilor Russ Silbiger said maybe the council should consider another member for the panel.

"I'd suggest somebody who's interested in mediation," he half-joked.

The panel would aid in the selection of a Quality Assurance/Quality Control Team of scientists that would check to make sure the ski area expansion doesn't damage the city's municipal watershed, which originates on Mount Ashland.

But on Tuesday, the Mt. Ashland Association Board of Directors sent the city council a letter saying they have already hired an environmental firm to monitor the expansion.

"Apparently this is not enough for the Ashland City Council as the council action proposed this evening would require not only that yet another environmental firm be hired, it also provides for not one, but two Quality Control/Quality Assurance groups," the letter said.

At the request of the council, City Administrator Martha Bennett will call Mt. Ashland Association members to ask if they are interested in having two people on the advisory panel.

Councilor Alice Hardesty suggested that the two councilors with the most experience on forestry and soils issues — Cate Hartzell and Kate Jackson — sit on the advisory panel.

Yet those two are most frequently at odds during council meetings. Tuesday night was no exception, with Jackson arguing that two at-large community members should sit on the panel rather than people specifically from the environmental community.

Hartzell favored two environmentalists sitting on the panel, the approach adopted by the council.

Councilor David Chapman was the only person to vote against the formation of the advisory panel, saying that it was a waste of the council's time to proceed until it was clear whether the Mt. Ashland Association would participate.

In other business that night, the council:

learned that residents can send contributions in care of the Ashland Bicycle and Pedestrian Commission for alternative transportation improvements in memory of Carole Wheeldon, a former city councilor and community volunteer who died last Friday from complications related to breast cancer;

heard the mayor's proclamation of this coming Friday as Car Free Day in Ashland;

approved a contract with Gary Nelson of Ashland Home Net to take over the Ashland Fiber Network's cable television service;

directed city staff to develop language for city rules banning residential open burning and requiring certified stoves for sold homes;

and voted to send a letter to Jackson County Commissioners opposing the large-scale conversion of agricultural lands to residential land.

Staff writer Vickie Aldous can be reached at 479-8199 or vlaldous@yahoo.com.