Well, one easy reason is that I live on the backside of that Mountain. I was told by the previous owners a couple of times that their teen-aged boys would take the lift up to the top and then do the backside to home.
I’ve always wondered about that story over the last 36 years but I got a great price on the house so I let it go.
As I was telling Steve: “This is the kind of thing that Ed Naile used to go after – a well-constrained/bounded problem, with just a few people involved, and a bunch of dollars”. Just have to figure out the sordid details and where it needs a Big Flashlight and the first tranche of emails I demanded start to show where problems are – and why. But more is needed.
As a Principal Consultant / Software Architect, my job was often to help figure out what had gone wrong with client software and it always came down to one of two things:
- Is it plugged in and is turned on (works for hardware AND software)?
- What is the root cause?
And elected/appointed officials and employees need to Follow The Law.
And at Wednesday’s GAC Public meeting during the Public Comment session, I identified that root cause and it is an either/or situation. However, which will win out? And what are the ramification for the citizens/taxpayers of Belknap County? I ask the correct questions after handing a couple of documents out to each of the Commissioners:
The rest of it was about getting my RSA 91:A demand satisfied after GMR President / GM Tom Day had refused to furnish the GMR budget – I asked the Commissioners to reverse that decision. And even though, at the surface, it seems to be a Right To Know over a budget, it really is “What IS this organization?”. Until that is decided, one way or another by whatever means, there will be problems.
Doug Lambert also stood up and gave a good talk about another question to be asked: “What is Gunstock from a local skier’s viewpoint – and has that been lost?”:
So, root causes. The “Is it plugged in and turned on” also is applicable to people as well. The question to be answered is WHO isn’t plugged in and WHO isn’t turned on” along with the even better question, similar to my ever favorite one of “What is the Proper Role of Government?” for this case is:
What is the Proper Role/Mission for Gunstock Mountain Resort?
Is it for the out-of-state markets that GMR is appealing to now wanting to turn itself into a destination place like much larger ski areas (with the attendant problems that accrue with size) or for for the residents of Belknap County? It’s not an either/or answer – the answer is where on the spectrum does it lie now, where SHOULD it lie in the near or mid-term future and how should it be structured and be operated to be optimal for that point on that spectrum line?
An to that last point, I have another post coming up that addresses that wide gulf. The answer that a question elicits is rather disturbing.
It is clear that there are wide differences of opinion on this. It is also clear that some don’t consider itself an entity of the State but that it is a business; a business that doesn’t like to be hamstrung with the rules / laws that it should be obeying.