Briefs Crested Butte

by Mark Reaman

Creative district looking for board members

The Crested Butte Town Council approved the establishment of a Creative District in town and a nine-member commission to go with it. Applications for those wanting to sit on the board are being accepted until January 8 and the hope is that the council will appoint the board members by mid-January so they can begin the pile of work that goes into organizing the district.

Town planner Michael Yerman and town councilman Jim Schmidt will sit on the board as non-voting members. Yerman said the idea is to have three artists as part of the board and four at-large members of the community. “We would really like some businesspeople with locations inside the district boundaries to participate,” he said.

Meeting updates

The council members gave some detailed reporting from the various boards they are on at the December 21 meeting. Councilman Paul Merck said the One Valley Prosperity Project subcommittee he is on is working on ways to feed 700 children in Gunnison that have access to low-cost school meals during the week but go hungry on weekends. He said the old Office for Resource Efficiency (ORE) has combined with the Coldharbour project and is working on a lot of new ideas. Councilwoman Laura Mitchell reported that the Crested Butte-Mt. Crested Butte Chamber of Commerce has concerns with the liability associated with the Visitor Center at Sixth and Elk since snow and ice can fall on people or vehicles pretty easily. Mitchell said the chamber board also expressed some concern with Vinotok preparations that impact their buildings and want the town to take over the bathrooms at the Four-way Stop.

Councilwoman Erika Vohman gave a detailed report on the OVPP housing subcommittee meeting she attended. She reported the actions being taken by the various entities in the valley.

Councilman Jim Schmidt said that representatives of Crested Butte and Mt. Crested Butte met to disperse money from the Growing Winters program. The $14,000 earmarked to promote winter events was split between four of six requests. Funded were winter marketing proposals for Crested Butte Nordic, the Crested Butte Center for the Arts, Two Plank Productions and Big Air on Elk, and the Mountain High Music festival. Not funded were requests from the Crested Butte Avalanche Center and the Santa Ski and Pub Crawl event.

Schmidt also reported that Anthracite Place might be a tad behind construction schedule. He said the roof was supposed to be completed by about Thanksgiving but was just now being completed. Some utility work is ahead of schedule however. “There is still hope to have the building done by the end of June,” he said. “The problem was hiring people, especially carpenters, to do the job.”

Big January ahead

The council is setting itself up for a busy January. They have yet to pick dates but plan to hold an all-day retreat that would focus on roles and responsibilities of a council and council priorities for the coming year. Work sessions on the Cemetery Committee progress as well as a meeting on local trail access are also being set. Plus the council wants to set aside several hours to review town manager Todd Crossett and town attorney John Belkin. That’s on top of the regular council meetings on the docket.