Hugh Carey / hcarey@summitdaily.com
As expected, Breckenridge Town Council on Tuesday favored entering a 50-year lease with Vail Resorts allowing the town to build its long-awaited parking garage on Breckenridge Ski Resort’s South Gondola Lot.
The lease details a desired timeline, each party’s responsibilities and how they’ll split control and parking revenues. It also comes with options for the town to renew for two additional 10-year terms, giving Breckenridge a 70-year run with the parking structure.
Following months of negotiations with Vail Resorts, owner of Breckenridge Ski Resort, on the lease agreement, Tuesday’s discussion before council went fairly quick, as council members had only a few questions about the proposed lease, mostly for clarification, and were highly complimentary of the effort to bolster parking with a new parking garage housing 950 parking spaces on the resort-owned surface parking lot.
“The agreement spells out a lot of specifics related to what the process will look like — the planning period, the construction period — and it’s the intent to only have that lot closed down for one full ski season,” town manager Rick Holman said before the vote. “We’ve been working jointly with (Vail Resorts) for a number of months to get this hammered out, and we feel very good about where it’s at right now.”
After the vote, which was unanimous, Mayor Eric Mamula expressed his gratitude for the work of Holman, assistant town manager Shannon Haynes and town attorney Tim Berry and for council’s approval of the agreement.
“I just want to say thank you before we go any father,” the mayor said. “This has been a long, long process … this is a big deal.”
In other business:
• Council approved an ordinance on second reading allowing the town to swap properties with the Summit School District. Breckenridge and the school district are working on an agreement that would exchange two Blue 52 townhomes and a 10-acre parcel on the McCain Subdivision for 8.7 acres of vacant land owned by the school district on Block 11.
• Council passed an ordinance on first reading to annex the Kenington Townhomes. According to the town, Breckenridge requested last summer that Kenington Townhome Owners join a valid annexation petition as part of a water-service agreement that required the owners to do so.
• Council approved a resolution honoring the town’s public works employees for their efforts that promotes quality of life and ensure vital services to the community by piggybacking a national effort and designating May 19-25 as Public Works Week in Breckenridge.