On May 19th, 2014, I interviewed Incorporate Olympic Valley (IOV) board members Dr. Fred Ilfeld and Tom Day at Tom’s home. I asked them to explain how the process of incorporation works and what strengths and weaknesses they foresee in the process.
Squaw Valley ski resort has officially come out against incorporation. I asked why they think that may be. It may be that KSL is afraid of the town council’s ability to potentially change zoning requirements and hence modify KSL’s development plans. The creation of Olympic Valley as a town could potentially cause some delays in the development that KSL is planning, as well.
“We are not anti-development” – Dr. Fred Ilfeld
IOV makes it clear in this interview that they are not anti-development. They are pro-development, but they want decision making for this valley and its future to be made locally.
If you would like to be involved in this process, please come to one of the IOV meetings. They are held on the first Tuesday of every month at the Squaw Valley Service Public District at 7pm.
We’d like to extend a special thank you to IOV board members Dr. Fred Ilfeld and Tom Day for this interview.
Video Table of Contents:
:20 = “What are Dr. Fred and Tom’s Roles at IOV?”
1:10 = “What is IOV?”
3:05 = “What’s the process of incorporating Olympic Valley?”
5:07 = “What is the revenue source of Olympic Valley?”
5:34 = “What tax revenue does Squaw Valley Ski Resort create?”
6:20 = “The final steps to the process of incorporating Olympic Valley?”
7:40 = “Where are we now in the process of incorporating Olympic Valley?”
8:20 = “In your opinion, is this a finically viable valley?
9:45 = “IOV is raising money right now. What are you raising money for?”
10:20 = “What would change in Olympic Valley if this incorporation is successful?”
13:00 = “If and when the incorporation of Olympic Valley comes to ballot, how many people would have to vote in favor of the motion for it to pass?”
13:18 = “Would taxes rise if Olympic Valley became a town?”
16:38 = “What do you know about anti-incorporation organization called Save Olympic Valley?
17:20 = “Some people feel that there aren’t enough qualified people in this valley to effectively run a town. What is your response to that?”
19:55 = “Which people, do you think, could potentially be candidates for the Town Council and for Mayor of Olympic Valley should the town successfully incorporate?”
21:30 = “How soon could this incorporation of Olympic Valley come to ballot?”
22:45 = “What is IOV’s opinion (and your personal opinion) of the development of Squaw Valley by KSL (current owners)?”
26:40 = “What has been your interaction with Squaw Valley President and CEO Andy Wirth?”
27:25 = “How many people generally come to your IOV meetings? How many meeting have you had?”
28:38 = “People who are against incorporating Olympic Valley have their reasons for being against it. What reasons have you heard to oppose incorporation?”
30:45 = “In your meeting with Andy Wirth, has he brought up any arguments against incorporation that you thought held water?”
32:25 = “If incorporation was successful, could the town council stop the development of Olympic Valley by Squaw Valley ski resort?”
32:50 = “Examples of successful, incorporated ski towns:”
Saw the link on UA and popped on over for a peek. Just love the balanced and indepth coverage.
Thanks for running informative prices like this and keeping it real unlike that other “website” Unofficial Adspace.
Thanks Rick Kane. We’ll do our best to not get all Turltely on ya.
Miles- like the interviews you are doing. This one and the one with Caldwell have been really informative.
Thanks, Coyote. We hope this answers a lot of questions the public has bout this issue. We have an interview scheduled with Andy Wirth in July. Should be another fun one.
What is interesting is the proposed town’s revenue comes from 25% from property taxes and 75% TOT tax and Ski Holdings only generates 20% of the TOT tax for the valley. The Lodge and Squaw Creek have also filed a petition for exclusion from the town along with Ski Holdings. IOV should have been more focused on Squaw Creek. Ski Holdings actually is not very significant in this picture in terms of revenue.
Fred and Tom said that Ski Holdings haven’t had any communication with them. Then, Fred says later in the interview that he has met with Andy twice and Andy requested a 3rd meeting with him. That was troublesome that he didn’t remember when asked. And the reason why Fred couldn’t meet the 3rd time was that he was on vacation for 3 weeks. He is retired and enjoying life, but he is gone 1/3 of the year and so is Tom. How do you think the movies get made? This is the point about having people with city government experience and willing to serve on a volunteer basis. The stipend is only a few hundred dollars or at least that is what they budgeted. Not exactly a windfall.
One town manager to run a city with volunteer city council? Even the planning dept aspect of this requires more people. They budgeted 2.5 inspectors and presently there are 15 inspectors working in Squaw on the regular residential projects, not a whole development at the base, the Creekside School or the Poulsen project.
IOV does need the EIR at some level now too since this interview. Even IOV’s lawyer said that they would need it. The costs on this process are probably going to be 2/3 higher than what they budgeted for. (100,000 turns into 300,000)
The money would be better spent on hiring professionals to work with the community to revise the general plan and draft proposals for revisions of the village plan. You don’t need a town to do so. Friends of SV and the Lodge has already made a lot of headway on their own to revise the village by doing just that.