Music, food, drink: Aspen ski patrol union to host community engagement party
Event to precede spring contract renegotiation
Courtesy photo
The Aspen ski patroller’s union will provide dinner, drinks, and live music for their inaugural community outreach event, slated for 7 p.m., Friday at the T-Lazy-7 Ranch.
Aspen Professional Ski Patrol Association, the union representing patrollers from all four Aspen mountains, will introduce themselves to the community and thank supporters to kickoff the event, before launching into a night filled with local tunes by Jes Grew, an Aspen rock ‘n roll and funk band, New York Pizza, drinks for purchase, and more.
“A lot of folks in our community don’t actually realize that we are a unionized patrol,” Union President Luke DeMuth said. “(The event) is a reminder and an outreach event to our community that we are here, we are an organized labor group.”
It’s also a chance for patrollers to meet and thank the local community off the ski hill, DeMuth added.
Founded in 1986 to improve working conditions for patrollers, the union currently strives to increase wages, secure more workforce housing, increase health benefits, and increase equipment funding as they approach their contract renegotiation this spring, DeMuth said.
The show on Friday will begin at 8 p.m. The union is selling tickets for $40 via their website, apspa.us. In collaboration with the Aspen Valley Ski and Snowboard Club, they will provide a shuttle from Aspen Highlands to and from the event starting at 6:45 p.m.
Proceeds from the Friday event will go toward the union.
Historically, the union has maintained a good relationship with Aspen Skiing Company, which they strive to continue, DeMuth said.
With the cost of living continually rising, contract negotiations will emphasize the importance of patroller retention to new SkiCo management, DeMuth said.
“Employee retention benefits both SkiCo and the guest,” DeMuth said. “It creates a well rounded and skilled group capable of effecting rescues and providing medical care, opening terrain and mitigating hazards in a dynamic environment.”
Aspen Skiing Company CEO Geoff Buchheister, who was hired in the spring of 2023, said SkiCo seeks in the renegotiations to continue engaging in constructive and active dialogue with the patrollers, focusing on how best to serve patrollers and SkiCo guests.
He added that SkiCo looks forward to attending the party on Friday in their continual support of patrol.
“While we lead the industry in both pay and benefits, we are always looking for additional ways to support our employees across the entire company with better pay, benefits, and housing opportunities,” Buchheister said.
DeMuth said the union wants to continue to work with SkiCo to keep them as leaders of the industry at large. But, he said there needs to be a radical shift in how companies compensate workers. The union, he said, is striving to provide workers with liveable wages in an industry that historically underpays its employees.
Andy Biehl, union representative for Aspen Highlands, said the patrol industry in general is underpaid given the difficulty of their work.
“We do really hard work under extremely dangerous circumstances for relatively low pay. And that’s been the industry standard,” Biehl said. “I think just because the industry offers low wages, doesn’t mean that we should accept low wages for what I believe to be a pretty high-caliber degree of work that we have across all four mountains.”
Basic patrollers in the 2024/25 season make $24 per hour, according to the current union contract with SkiCo.
DeMuth, who couldn’t specify desired wages since contract specifics have not yet been disclosed to SkiCo, said they will negotiate this coming year.
“This spring is a negotiation year for us,” DeMuth said. “And we on the executive committee are working closely to try to pin down what we would like to see as a new minimum wage and then eventually an average patrol wage.”
The union is also working to improve health benefits, equipment, and housing.
In the current contract, patrollers get health benefits starting in their second year. Getting full benefits for rookies, “is one of the options on the table now,” DeMuth said.
SkiCo currently provides a $1,000 to $1,400 stipend for patrollers to buy equipment, which patrollers often exceed in their equipment purchases as they wear through multiple pairs of skis or boots every season, DeMuth said. They hope to increase the equipment budget in the upcoming negotiations.
While patrollers are allotted 10 beds in SkiCo workforce housing, they employ between 180 and 190 patrollers between the four mountains, DeMuth said.
They hope to work with SkiCo to provide more beds for full-time, year-round patrollers, DeMuth said.
The average cost to rent an unsubsidized one-bedroom apartment in Aspen is $8,000 per month, according to Zillow, a real estate company.
“As cost of living goes up and all these resort communities, it gets harder and harder to make a living out of (patrolling),” Biehl said. “I can’t imagine paying first, last, and security deposit on an apartment in this rental market.”
The union strives to ensure that those who want to can make a living out of patrolling, Biehl added.
“Just ensuring that we’re making a livable wage and that this is something that people are hopefully able to make a career out of,” Biehl said. “Like a lot of us have done and intend to do for the rest of our days.”
Skyler Stark-Ragsdale can be reached at 970-429-9152 or email him at sstark-ragsdale@aspentimes.com.
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