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The Telluride ski patrol strike entered its ninth day Saturday with no resolution in sight, even as the resort announced plans to reopen Monday with severely limited terrain. One lift. Access to the bunny hill. The 78-member Telluride Professional Ski Patrol Association remains on strike, negotiations remain stalled, and lodging bookings have dropped 54% compared to last year.
For skiers who planned their holidays around Telluride’s terrain, the closure has been a scramble. Some headed to Crested Butte, which reported being fully booked through New Year’s. Others are finding their way to Monarch Mountain, the independently owned ski area near Salida that’s offering something rare in the ski industry: three days of free skiing to anyone affected by the strike.
The Monarch Offer: What You Need to Know
Monarch Mountain is extending three complimentary lift tickets to Telluride employees and their dependents, anyone with a valid Telluride season pass, and anyone with proof of a Telluride day ticket purchased between December 29 and January 8. The offer runs through January 8, with a maximum of one free ticket per day.
The logistics are straightforward. Call 719-530-5000 or check Monarch’s website for details. The drive from Telluride takes roughly three hours – not convenient, but manageable for skiers whose vacation plans have been upended.
Monarch is smaller than Telluride, with nine lifts serving 1,146 acres of terrain. But it’s been making the most of limited snowfall this season. At last report, 54 of 80 trails were open, all on natural snow. The resort doesn’t have snowmaking, which makes its current conditions something of a minor miracle given Colorado’s slow start to winter.
The first group to take advantage of the offer arrived from Georgia – seven skiers who’d booked Telluride and pivoted when the strike closed the mountain. “They were happy,” said Bob Nicolls, who has owned Monarch since 2002. “Phone calls are coming in. Some people think our offer is not real.”
It’s real. Chris Haggerty, Monarch’s general manager, framed the decision in terms that speak to how smaller resorts operate. “Colorado’s ski areas share a strong sense of community, and when guests and employees are impacted, we believe it’s important to step up and help keep people skiing and riding,” he said. “We’re happy to welcome Telluride guests and team members to Monarch for a great day on snow.”
Where the Strike Stands
Telluride’s announcement that it would reopen Monday came after what the resort described as a “collaborative meeting” with the patrol union on Saturday. The resort plans to run one lift – access to beginner terrain only – while it continues recruiting temporary workers.
The patrol union remains on strike. Graham Hoffman, the union president, said by text that he was reviewing the resort’s latest offer but expressed frustration at the timing. “Seeing an immediate press release before the ink is even dry doesn’t help build the already damaged trust we have in the company,” he wrote Saturday morning.
Since the strike launched December 27, resort owner Chuck Horning has not reached out to patrollers with a new proposal, according to Hoffman. “They don’t seem interested in communicating with us whatsoever,” he said earlier this week.
The wage dispute centers on pay structure and retention. The resort’s most recent offer would bring the median hourly wage to $30, with a range from $23.50 for first-year patrollers to $46 for veterans. The union is seeking a median wage of $35.09, with a range from $26 to $53. Both sides and community leaders have said the financial gap between the two proposals is roughly $100,000 to $115,000 in the first year.
For patrollers, the issue goes beyond the immediate numbers. They argue that Telluride’s compressed wage structure makes it impossible to retain experienced patrollers, which affects safety. Seven patrollers left over the summer. The resort was only able to hire four qualified replacements.
The economic impact on Telluride has been severe. Lodging occupancy between late December and early January sits at 56%, down from 72% during the same period last season. Local businesses that depend on winter tourism are watching nervously. The week between Christmas and New Year’s is typically one of the busiest of the season.
What Smaller Resorts Understand
Monarch’s gesture isn’t charity – it’s culture. Independent ski areas operate with a different calculus than corporate resorts. When Nicolls and his ownership group bought Monarch for just over $5 million in 2002, the industry consensus was that ski resorts needed real estate development to survive. Nicolls ignored that wisdom. He focused on the ski experience instead.
The result has been steady growth. Season pass sales have increased 25 to 30 percent annually over the past five years. The resort is financially healthy enough to pay cash for its recent No Name Basin expansion – no outside investors, no debt. Nicolls maintains enough reserves to cover what he calls a “nuclear winter” that would prevent the resort from opening, including keeping employees paid so they’d return the following year.
That financial discipline creates flexibility for decisions like offering free tickets to displaced Telluride skiers. It’s not a massive expense for Monarch, and it builds goodwill in Colorado’s ski community. Crested Butte has benefited from the same dynamic. The resort, about a three-hour drive from Telluride, reported being fully booked with overflow from the strike.
There’s an ethos at work here that extends beyond individual business decisions. Colorado’s ski areas exist in a shared ecosystem. When one mountain goes dark, others step up. It’s practical solidarity – the kind that makes sense when you’re running a business that depends on people choosing to drive hours into the mountains to slide down snow.
This isn’t about vilifying corporate ownership or romanticizing the independent model. Both structures have advantages and problems. But the Monarch response highlights something that gets lost when ski resorts become portfolio assets: the value of being embedded in a community, of making decisions that prioritize relationships over quarterly returns.
What Happens Next
For skiers with Telluride plans, the options are limited. Monday’s reopening will provide access to beginner terrain only – not much use for anyone who booked Telluride for its challenging runs. Monarch’s offer provides an alternative through January 8. Other Colorado resorts are accessible, though without special arrangements.
For the strike itself, Monday’s partial reopening doesn’t signal resolution. The patrol remains on strike. The resort is recruiting temporary workers to fill gaps. Neither side appears ready to compromise. How long this lasts depends on variables neither party controls: how long patrollers can hold out financially, how much economic pain the community can endure, whether Horning decides the cost of the strike exceeds the cost of meeting patrol demands.
Park City’s patrol strike last winter lasted 12 days before both sides reached agreement. That strike cost Vail Resorts an estimated $375 million in stock value and contributed to the eventual departure of the company’s CEO. Telluride’s situation is different – smaller resort, private ownership, different dynamics. But the Park City precedent suggests these standoffs don’t resolve quickly.
Check Monarch Mountain’s website or call 719-530-5000 for current details on the free ticket offer. For Telluride updates, monitor the resort’s official channels, though announcements have been sparse. The strike that started as a holiday disruption has stretched into the second week of January with no clear end in sight.
The lifts at Telluride will spin again eventually. Whether it’s Monday with limited terrain or later with full operations depends on conversations happening – or not happening – between a resort owner and the patrollers who know the mountain best.
