The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
Applications for next distribution due in August
The Mt. Crested Butte Town Council has divvied up what started out as $55,000 in admissions tax grants to cover nearly $93,000 in requests from non-profits and one business hoping to ramp up traffic to the mountain for the summer season. But after weighing the value of each of the seven requests, the council ended up dipping into its reserve to grant $66,430.
After granting $60,000 last year, the council suggested lowering the grants to a total of $55,000. “Andrew Gitin and I are recommending we pull back slightly because we’re down slightly in revenues,” councilman David Clayton said at the meeting Tuesday, March 6.
The town tacks a 4 percent tax onto event ticket sales on the mountain, such as lift and concert tickets. That money goes into a fund, 25 percent of which is used to pay for transportation operations. The rest goes to marketing events that will bring people and money to the mountain.
The Crested Butte Wine and Food Festival, going strong for five years, asked the council to cover $7,500 for the design of online ads and social media campaigns, a ticket and lodging sales event in Denver and additional ad placement in Crested Butte publications. The council decided $5,000 was enough.
The Trailhead Children’s Museum, located slopeside at the base area, applied for funds to cover just 30 percent of the non-profit’s marketing budget for the upcoming season, or $1,829. Trailhead executive director Katie Mueller told the council the organization is serving more than 10,000 kids and families and are expecting 20 percent growth in the coming year.
The council didn’t blink at the amount, except maybe to misread the request. They ended up rounding off the request for the Trailhead and granted $1,830. “It’s a great improvement for the two- to six-year-old age range and gives families another reason to spend more time in the base area,” town manager Joe Fitzpatrick said.
The Crested Butte Music Festival, along with Bluegrass in Paradise, came to the council with a request for $22,500 from the admissions tax money to continue marketing efforts. The Music Festival is partnering with the town in its pursuit of the Mt. Crested Butte Performing Arts Center and the summer festival is expected to generate 2,200 guest-nights in 2012.
Although the council aligns closely with the Music Festival, with the limited amount of money being offered they gave CBMF $20,000 to market the 44 performances over the six-week festival.
Team Prep USA, which brings high school athletes from across the country to the valley for high-elevation training in the summer, also asked for a large grant, requesting $20,000 for marketing online and in two separate running magazines.
Since the pot of money being offered was so small, the council decided to grant them $4,000. “Team Prep did a nice job with the application, but the council didn’t think the impact was big enough to grant that much money,” Fitzpatrick said.
The Crested Butte Arts Festival, which is celebrating its 40th anniversary this summer, is going to be expanding its culinary arts offerings on the mountain and also plans to bring “The Art of the Ride” back, after that mountain biking workshop with local riders got a good response from participants. The Arts Festival asked for $10,000 and walked away with $5,000.
Crested Butte Publishing, a business offering the Explore CB app for smartphones, asked for $6,000, which the owners said would help subsidize the cost of participating in the project for local businesses, who currently have to pay $35 per month to be listed on the app. The money could reduce the cost for businesses by as much as 40 percent, they said.
The council voted to grant them $5,600 for their venture.
But the big winner of the admissions tax grants was—wait for it—the USA Pro Cycling Challenge, which is coming to the valley for the second year and received $25,000. The council agreed that the locally hosted stage of the bike race was the biggest event of the summer and deserves the town’s support.
“The Pro Cycling Challenge was exciting, but it’s not established yet,” Fitzpatrick said. “It’s no different than Bluegrass in Paradise in that it’s not quite as big yet as we think it could be. So we have to keep feeding it.”
Applications for admissions tax dollars for the winter 2012-13 distribution will be due in August. For more information contact the Mt. Crested Butte town office at 349-6632.
