A new lodge at the North Creek Ski Bowl for visitors at the Gore Mountain ski center opened on Friday after delays, setbacks and conflicts between a state authority and the town of Johnsburg.

Johnsburg Supervisor Mark Smith, who took office this month, said the town and the Olympic Regional Development Authority (ORDA) forged a deal in recent days that the prior administration was unable to complete.

It allows ORDA to pay to have wastewater generated at the new lodge stored in holding tanks and hauled to a treatment plant in Queensbury while the town continues building a sewer system.

As a result, a “soft” opening of the North Creek Ski Bowl lodge, The Station, is this weekend. According to Smith, the lodge is expected to be fully in operation by the typically busy Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend, which kicks off Friday, Jan. 16.

“We’re going to fix this relationship,” Smith said about the partnership he hopes to develop with the Olympic authority. He said it makes no sense to be an “obstructionist.”

The base lodge was the crowning component of a ORDA-managed $40 million project on town property to benefit Gore users and the region.

However, some of last year’s town board leaders, including Supervisor Kevin Bean, had been pushing ORDA to pay expenses the town was incurring to cater to the authority’s project, as well as other bills. One was $4,000 owed to the town’s engineering consultants. Bean did not return a call.

“That’s a $40 million investment,” Smith said of the Ski Bowl project. “You don’t want to be held up because some guy says you owe $4,000 in engineering bills.”

Disagreements over MOU

The authority had balked at agreeing to a memorandum of understanding voted on by the town board in November that included elements not agreed to by ORDA, including the $4,000 bill, according to a letter from ORDA President and CEO Ashley Walden. 

ORDA also was uneasy about agreeing to pay to hold and haul wastewater generated at the new lodge without knowing when the town’s long-delayed municipal wastewater system would be built.

Smith said he cannot provide a date for the completion of the project, which he said should have been finished months ago.

Walden, in a letter responding to the November MOU vote, expressed “serious concern and disappointment” with the Johnstown board.

She listed multiple proposals put forth by town officials in months past she considered inappropriate.

They included, she said, trying to require ORDA to pay a “disputed” engineering bill, fund a multi-million dollar shortfall for inflationary costs accrued during the town’s wastewater treatment system planning, directing ORDA to refrain from replacing its primary snowmaking pipe unless it agreed to pay the town $175,000 annually and seeking to get a cut of ORDA’s ticket and parking revenues.

“This approach undermines our shared ability to deliver projects that benefit residents, local businesses, and the region as a whole,” she wrote. “ORDA’s operations are not a revenue source for the town of Johnsburg. Our investments at Gore Mountain are intended to enhance local opportunity, not to offset municipal expenses.”

She said that the town would not let ORDA test its fire suppression system at the new lodge until paying the engineering bill, forcing ORDA to instead place $14,000 in escrow while details were reviewed. 

“Despite these setbacks, we remain optimistic that we can rebuild a foundation of trust and resume a productive, forward-looking relationship,” she said.

Ski Bowl lodge moves ahead

Smith said he agreed to lay the $4,000 engineering bill aside for now, even though ORDA is willing to pay it once it receives more information related to the charges.

The town board previously agreed to forgo a 30-day review of a liquor license for the new lodge to allow alcoholic beverages to be served. Food and beverage operator Shaun Hazlett, running Timber & Thyme at the lodge, did not return a call.

ORDA lists the lodge as 18,000 square feet of space with a restaurant, retail, lockers and access to the slopes. It did not release a date for opening, although the Gore Mountain Facebook page made an announcement that comports with Smith’s comments, adding that food service will start on Jan. 16.