Attendees: Will Kriewald, Leigh Michl, Andrew Snow, Brian Williams (scribe), Bryan Hall, Richard Gervase, Matt Lillard, Brad Noble, Andrew Carey, Geordie Hall
Absent: Jeff Wittingham, Meg Schultz
Agenda
1:00 pm – Call to order – Will Kriewald
1:01 pm – Review May minutes – Will Kriewald/Brian Williams
1:05 pm – Review May and FYTD Financials – Andrew Snow
1:15 pm – Review cash flow forecast – Andrew Snow
1:20 pm – Discussion on proposed 2026 Budget (Action – Vote on proposed Budget)
1:45 pm – Action – Vote on Proposed Fund Balances
1:55pm – Action Vote – on 2026 Committee Slate
2:00 pm – Adjournment
Approval of Minutes from Prior meeting
Geordie made a motion to approve, Andrew C seconded. Motion approved.
May – Andrew Snow’s comments in Chat added at end of these minutes
Revenue
Quiet month. 9 days pub op versus 6 from last year increased revenue above budget.
Expense
Basebox expenses are up with increased business and start-up food costs. Some additional labor costs associated with stocking up prior to tariffs for retail items. Cost for retail items on the balance sheet.
Net Ordinary Income
$375K ahead of budget YTD.
Cash Flow May
Total Cash Review
Slightly below last year due to continued loan payments (Co-op POP support and plow) and less SMF funding than anticipated for the double mid-station project partially offset by the great NOI for the season.
Cash Flow 2024-25 Projection
We received $67K in May from SMF for the double mid-station project. We still have a shortage of $167K versus anticipated. We are no longer anticipating any additional funding for the double mid-station in the current cash flow projection from SMF. Matt – There will be a discussion on CFC fundraising goals at the upcoming board meeting to focus on the Pub project. Richard- Do SMF not have funds or are they using funds for other issues? Matt – no available funds. Richard – Are their concerns with SMF fundraising? Matt – They need to get more effective. Bryan (a CFC member) concurred with Matt. Fine tuning the messaging for improved fundraising.
Geordie – Question about checking back with legacy donors on their commitments. Matt – we are not writing off the pledged amount for the double mid-station but reflecting a conservative position (Will agreed). Andrew – we need to close out the capital project this year for tax purposes/depreciation. The grant funded portion will also begin depreciation.
Richard – what about the current work being done on the Pub and the SMF portion? Is it expected to be funded? Will this situation impact on the ongoing/future projects? Andrew S – this is specific to double mid-station.
Richard – should we include a planning case with no additional funding for the Pub? Andrew C – no, the CFC got started late on the double mid-station fundraising and it is tougher than other fundraising as it has already been installed. There are donors out there. Regular yearly 200K$ capital budget funded by Co-op. Bryan – not a lack of desire but more of the reasons noted above.
Geordie – will there be a specific fundraising for the Pub. Will – let’s leave this for the next meeting. Andrew C – Likely to rev up this fall.
Richard – keep in our mind what we will receive moving forward. Also, SMF has been restricted for fundraising in the past as their focus is mountain preservation projects and not Co-op money making endeavors.
Impact of removing $160K from SMF from the projected cash flow is that we will be drawing more cash from the brokerage accounts than previously anticipated. We will still be in excess of the fund minimum requirements (more on that later) at the cash low point projected in August.
2025-2026 Budget – Andrew Snow’s comments in Chat added to the end of these minutes
Revenue
See summary for highlights (add). Target is a break-even budget. Looking at pricing increases to cover basic increases for costs outside of direct staffing. Retail costs increased as has been done for other departments in the past.
Revenue is 8% above LY budget and 8% below 25 actuals. It was a strong season as operations were full across all the holiday periods (Christmas, MLK, Presidents). The only disappointment was March weather impact that significantly impacted the closing month.
Andrew C – Is there a target wage for individuals and for aggregate? Andrew S – this a summer project to look at each department and benchmark with other ski areas as well as staff discussion on livable wage. Anecdotally, we are getting good year-over-year folks coming back which is indicative of a competitive offering.
Will – income: Overall service income increase (10%). What is our level of confidence? Andrew S – Racing is dependent on the number of youth races. Last year’s budget was simply too low. Ski school had a great year with great energy. Big growth in mid-week adult programs. Increase in budget revenue reflects this.
59% of day tickets bought online last year. Formula driven but overall discount against window prices. Season passes are mostly set and the easiest to budget.
Expenses
8% increase in cost versus LY budget expected.
Geordie – How much of our traffic is Canadian? Jay took a big hit. Feel 1-2% is Canadian traffic but need to look at zip codes. Matt – Canadian visits are focused on March with their vacation. Poor March this season not a good indicator.
New executive chef position for basebox to help support overall basebox management. Significant increase. Geordie – Concerned about “Executive” title and a changing of the menu. Matt – Plan for the “executive” is more administrative versus creative dishes. Andrew S – Standard job name for the role.
Net operating income at $6.3K profit.
New: request to revisit the budget at September meetings (Finance and Board), especially around basebox operation. Do we want to call it a tentative approval?
Correction made to net income spreadsheet comment line. Numbers correct, cell reference corrected. Plowing net income is not included. 80K$ bottom line (net income) with interest.
Geordie made a motion to recommend for board approval the proposed budget for final review in September. Brian second. Motion approved.
Increase of operating from 400 to 450. Move non-operating from 500 to 750.
We easily have enough in available cash to increase the minimum funding levels even at our projected August cash low point. We do not have a full 2025-2026 cash flow yet and may have Pub funding. We may need to revisit funding levels based upon future decisions regarding the Pub project in 2026.
Andrew C – a concern that we are limiting Matt and Andrew’s operating flexibility even though they asked for this. Will – needed for good governance structure.
Geordie made a motion to recommend for board approval an increase of the operating fund from 400K$ to 450K$ and non-operating fund from 500K$ to 750K$. Richard second. Motion approved.
Slate of candidates for Finance board for the following year
The following have indicated their desire to remain on the Finance committee for 2025-2026 fiscal year
Brian Williams
Geordie Hall
Leigh Michl
Richard Gervase
Brad Noble
Meg Schultz
Meg would like to stay but time challenged. Tentative agreement to move the meeting to a 10AM timeframe. This will be confirmed via the group chat prior to our next meeting in September.
The committee will also include board members Andrew, Bryan and Will or new board members in their place. Andrew C – would like to amend membership to note this new board members.
Suggestion was made to finalize in September via a formal committee slate ratification. Brad noted that it is good and best practice to get the discussion completed as we have done.
Will made a motion to close the meeting (7 minutes late to balance with the 7 minutes early from the May meeting). Andrew C second. Motion approved.
Addendum – Andrew Snow’s Chat comments:
May Financials
May is always one of the quietest months financially, so there isn’t too much exciting in the monthly reports. That being said, the Basebox started off the season with good business and we’re pleased that we hit budget for the month.
On the balance sheet, you’ll see that our cash balance is lower than it was a year ago, but there are several factors that contributed to that:
We’ve invested around $1 million in capital in the past year with only $191k of that covered by SMF as of 5/31/25, and we had already received that SMF funding as of May 2024
We’ve paid down both loans by a combined $57.8k
In Karen’s efforts to beat tariff-related price increases, we have $24.5k more retail inventory on hand than a year ago
Cash Flow Forecast
Last week, we received a payment of $67,000 from SMF towards the Sunnyside project. At this point, there is no commitment or guarantee for further funding for that project this summer, so I have removed the additional payments from the forecast. This represents $167k less grant funding compared to the prior forecast. We have also increased the capital spending to ~$300k, in line with our approved CIP list and an increase of around $100k from last month’s version of the CF.
The result of those changes, and a couple other factors, is that we’ll need to pull more money from the brokerage account than originally planned. Last month’s cash flow had us pulling $385k between June and August, and now I have us pulling $695k between May and August:
$200k May (actual)
$165k Jun
$165k Jul
$165k Aug
In total, this is an increase of $310k from last month’s projection ($167k less SMF grant income, $100k increase in CIP spending, balance from bigger increase in inventory, timing of covering expenses, etc.). Of course, we will continue to make efforts to keep as much invested in the brokerage accounts, for as long as possible.
Budget
In the folder you will find a Budget Summary spreadsheet that outlines our proposed budget department by department, with extensive notes. It also provides a comparison to our current budget, the projection for the current fiscal year, as well as budget & actuals from a year ago. There is also a Budget Proposal Summary Word document that outlines our assumptions and highlights major changes from a year ago. Note that this year our plan is to seek conditional approval of the budget in June, with a plan to review and potentially revise the budget later in the summer. If any significant changes are proposed at that time, we’ll present them to the Finance Committee and board at the September meetings.
