First Post to Save Big Squaw Ski Resort

Hello Everyone,

I am here today to address an issue that needs to be addressed. The Big Squaw Ski "Resort"
in Greenville Maine always had been a true favorite amongst skiers. It's sweeping views of Moosehead lake were breathtaking. All seemed to be well when James Confalone bought the resort from the state in 1995. He said he would make it into a "World Class Resort." That sounded great to the state and to the skiers. Included in the deal with the state was an agreement to run the resort for "X" amount of days a year. Although it had seen snowmaking improvements, it was still very far from a world class resort. In the 2005 season, everything went downhill. First a chair on the chairlift slipped back on the cable, maybe even fell (sources have contradicting info on this), causing injuries to two people. One was a surgeon and broke his dominant wrist. The probably will prohibit him from performing surgeries ever again. So this accident happens. The chairlift should be fixed for the next season. Right? Wrong! The whole upper mountain that was serviced by this lift has been closed since that season. James Confalone has used this ordeal as a way to let the ski resort run down into huge disrepair. The double chairlift still needs to be replaced/repaired. This cuts off access to the entire upper mountain. The hotel and restaurant are closed. And as far as I can tell the lower mountain triple chairlift is running without a license.
Now, Mr. James Confalone does not have a clean record. He owned Chalk's Airlines. One of his seaplanes crashed in Miami killing a dozen or so people. The cause of the crash was determined to be lack of proper maintenance. That tells you something about how this guy is unwilling to maintain his equipment(upper mountain chairlift.)He is also not running it for the minimum number of days he is supposed to, determined in his deal with the state. He only ran it in the 06-07 season on the weekends. The state should seize the property back from him. He bought it for $300,000 in 1995. Quite the bargain. He now is unwilling to sell for less than 9 million and when he has been approached he has kept raising the price.
What should happen right now is that the recent development plans purposed by Plum Creek to develop the area should include buying the resort and selling it to someone the will run it properly.