With shot ski under our belts and Halloween on Main on tap, the annual signs of approaching winter are everywhere you look this month. As we prepare for the return of thousands of essential seasonal workers, October events were notable on our accessible housing front.
This month, the chamber is promoting an expanded Workforce Employer Rental Incentive Program directly to Park City residents. In partnership with Mountainlands Community Housing Trust and Rossignol, if you decide to rent a bedroom or unit to any workers at our 900+ chamber partners, you receive a choice of Rossignol skis (alpine or nordic) or snowboard, plus bindings.
It is an excellent offer, but due to gear availability, it expires Oct. 31, so you must act soon. Get details at housinghelp.org/housing-resource-center.
We’re also connecting seasonal employees with housing and other resources with our comprehensive seasonal worker webpage, back for a second season at VisitParkCity.com/members/resources.
On Oct. 12, Park City Mountain, Summit County and Columbus Pacific Development cut the ribbon at Slopeside Village, a major new addition to our housing picture. Visible from Highway 224 adjacent to the Cabriolet lift, Slopeside offers 1,189 beds in a dorm-style arrangement with rent ranging from $436 to $1,100. Vail Resorts is reserving 441 beds for its workers after the first batch of units opened last December.
Beyond providing beds for worker heads, there are at least two reasons Slopeside is essential. One is quality. Summit County Chair Roger Armstrong has rightly stated it is a mistake to build workforce-accessible housing cheaply, creating spaces where no one really wants to live. Slopeside emphatically does not have that problem. Rent includes community rooms, a fitness center, housekeeping services and storage. As seen from the highway, the structures have definite eye appeal. In the next phase on two adjacent acres, we will see studios as well as one- and two-bedroom units.
Another crucial factor is public/private financing. The Canyons Village Management Association assessed Canyon Village properties and allocated some of the money to Summit County to buy the Slopeside site, which the county then leased to Columbus Pacific for construction. It’s a smart arrangement. The community and Vail Resorts get quality housing at affordable prices for local and seasonal workers, and Canyons Village can proceed with other development plans.
On Oct. 4, Park City Municipal and the J. Fisher Companies broke ground on the EngineHouse apartments. Just off Kearns on Homestake Road, EngineHouse will deliver 99 rental units to people earning 58 percent or less of area median income, the first such public/private partnership for Park City Municipal. EngineHouse is going up on land owned by the city and leased to J. Fischer, which is designating 99 of the 123 units as income restricted.
In a highly desirable location close to shopping, services, restaurants and transit, EngineHouse advances the city’s goal of adding 800 income-restricted units by 2026. It’s also something of an environmental reclamation model — developers removed quantities of soil containing lead and zinc, left over from our silver mining past.
Fixing a housing crisis is a complex and long-term proposition, and we are far from fixing ours. However, it is good to celebrate the progress the community is making together — one way to stay motivated to keep at it!
Jennifer Wesselhoff is the president and CEO of the Park City Chamber of Commerce & Visitors Bureau.