farewell, from a piece of riffraff

Hoo boy, lots of excitement locally recently regarding statements made by Kaye Ferry, executive director of the Vail Chamber and Business Association. The original inflammatory quote from the Colorado Confidential article:

“Throughout the history of (Vail) we have appealed to exclusivity. The only people we let up there during Christmas are the ones with the big homes and their ski instructors. We had eliminated the Front Range riff-raff, and all of a sudden we’re selling a pass that’s to the masses.”

That’s the main point sticking in a lot of people’s craws, but there’s this gem too:

“They’re paying $2,500 a night for a room, and then they’re fearing for the lives of their grandkids when they going skiing over Christmas,” said Ferry, who also works as a ski instructor at Vail and was struck and injured by a snowboarder last ski season.

Leaving aside the dubious claim that Front Range skiers are somehow causing danger on the slopes [because as we all know, the nouveau riche Texas oil-man wearing jeans and his fur-clad big-haired blonde trophy wife with leopard print tights caroming down the greens and blues are totally jawesome skiers], those statements are just plain silly.

Here’s my mail sent to the following:

• Amy Kemp, Vail Resorts Senior Corporate Communications Manager
• Kelly Ladyga, Vail Resorts Corporate Communications Director
• Jen Brown, Vail Mountain Senior Communications Manager
• Stan Zemler, Vail Town Manager
• Vail Chamber & Business Association

Hello,

In the past few weeks, as a great ski season has been winding
down, I’ve been excited to learn about the new Vail Epic pass. As
a loyal Colorado Pass holder for the past several years, it was
very exciting to learn that Vail Resorts was continuing to
innovate and better serve its customers.

After reading of Faye Kerry’s condescending remarks referring to
Front Range residents as “riffraff”, I’m no longer interested in
the Epic pass. I’m also going to skip the Colorado pass as well,
for the first time in several years.

Although Ms. Kerry denies the statement, a follow-up article in
the Denver Post states:

“Colorado Confidential stands by the story, and I
personally stand by the story, including all the quotes
in the story attributed to Kaye,” said [David] Williams,
a West Vail resident and a reporter in Colorado since
1988.

I’ll choose to believe Williams, thanks.

This piece of riffraff lives in Fort Collins and owns condos in
both Summit and Grand counties, and spends much of the winter on
the slopes. I have also been contemplating a future condo
purchase at Beaver Creek as well.

No thanks — it will be very easy for me to convert to a loyal
Intrawest customer, and to recommend the same to all of my fellow
riffraff as well as my out-of-town visitors.

For what it’s worth, I would be interested in seeing Ms. Kerry’s
dream of exclusivity carried out as an experiment, and watch Vail
Resorts, as well as the town of Vail, attempt to sustain
themselves based on one week of Christmas visitors.

good luck,

/ac

For more reading:

• “Front Range riff raff” should stay out of Vail
• Vail doesn’t want “Front Range riff-raff;” that means you
• Vail chamber chief denies calling nonlocals “riffraff”
• Ferry ‘Riff-Raff’ Comments Spark Firestorm of Controversy Statewide