Juneau’s city-owned ski area expects to run a deficit for the foreseeable future. That’s because officials plan to repair some broken and aging infrastructure while boosting pay to employees and preparing to operate year-round.
But their plan to dig out of the deficit relies heavily on revenue from a gondola that has yet to be built.
Deferred repairs and maintenance for Eaglecrest Ski Area’s aging infrastructure have built up over decades of use. At a Juneau Assembly finance committee meeting on Wednesday, Eaglecrest’s board president Mike Satre said it’s reaching a tipping point.
“We have to do something different, or we will essentially be shutting down the operation as infrastructure fails or is beyond its useful life,” he said.
That something different is a gondola that the city bought for about $2 million three years ago. It’s still sitting on the ground and it’s unclear how much it will cost to get it going.
But the plan is that once it’s up and running, it will allow the ski area to operate year-round and eventually make enough money for it to be self-sustaining.
That’s likely still years out. In the interim, the ski area’s management says some repairs need to happen to other infrastructure. According to General Manager Craig Simmons, those come with a cost.
“None of those numbers are small,” he said.
Eaglecrest officials also want to increase staffing levels and pay as they transition to operate year-round. That means they’re going to be spending more money than they’re making until the gondola is open.
At the finance meeting, the Juneau Assembly moved forward with a plan that would allow the city-owned ski area to run a deficit, but it set aside about $3 million in the city’s restricted budget reserve in case Eaglecrest can’t dig itself out. That safety net is required by city code.
“If Eaglecrest was to have their full budget run through next fiscal year and then Douglas fell off into the ocean and didn’t exist and there was no way that they could recover that, then that hole would need to be filled,” city Finance Director Angie Flick said. “That reserve is there in case that hole needs to be filled in the future.”
This isn’t the first time Eaglecrest has run a deficit. It operated with a negative fund balance for almost a decade after its board gave refunds and credits to season pass holders in 2003 to make up for a poor snow season.
At the meeting, Assembly member Alicia Hughes-Skandijs voted in favor of the plan. But she said she’s still skeptical of how much it will cost to get the gondola off the ground.
“I would bet a lot of money that we can’t build the gondola without infusing a significant amount of money in it,” she said. “That’s just outside of Eaglecrest’s control – it really just has to do with the cost of building anything in the world.”
A local Alaska Native corporation, Goldbelt Incorporated, invested $10 million in the gondola in 2022 in exchange for a revenue-sharing agreement. Satre said that funding has helped pay for most of the expenses so far, but with the Trump administration’s new tariffs kicking in, costs could go up.
“I would expect it to exceed the $10 million that we have, and then we’ll have to make some decisions,” he said.
Assembly member Wade Bryson was the only member to vote against the plan to reserve money for Eaglecrest. He argued that Eaglecrest has had financial issues for years. For at least the past 25 years, Eaglecrest has required support from the city’s general fund for its operations.
“When do we stop?” he said. “How high does their ask have to be before we say, the community cannot afford this?”
He recently asked city officials to find out what it would take to privatize the ski area.
“I fully believe that Eaglecrest is the gem of the community — that does need a new chapter written for it,” he said. “I don’t believe that there’s enough money in the CBJ government to do that.”
The Assembly still needs to finalize the city budget and the plan is still subject to change. Members are expected to vote to finalize it in mid-June.
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