Ski resorts work to bring in minorities

About 2,500 kids strap on skis under that program each season — and many of them get hooked, even if they’re clumsy on the first runs.

“It looked easy, but once you got up there, it was hard,” said Priscilla Medina, who was a freshman at Fresno’s Sunnyside High School last spring when she tried out — and loved — her first time on a snowboard.

Her parents don’t ski and only come up to play in the snow “once in a great while,” she said. Medina said she plans to come back.

In Colorado, a similar program is aimed at building a connection between urban kids and some of the most exclusive ski resorts in the country. Places like Aspen and Vail traditionally draw international visitors undaunted by spending big money to hit the slopes in style.

It’s an appeal that has largely eluded minorities in nearby Denver. Jensen said only about 5 percent of Vail’s guests are minorities.

The cost of skiing at an elite destination resort coupled with the “hassle” factor — figuring out where to go, what equipment’s necessary and even who to go with — has worked to create a gap between Denver’s Hispanic population and Vail that is much wider than the 100 miles that separate them, said Roberto Moreno, founder of Alpino, an organization dedicated to diversifying the slopes.

Working with Vail, Keystone, Beaver Creek and Breckenridge, Alpino has brought about 4,000 kids to the mountains each year, giving them all they need for a day on the snow for $22.50.

“A lot of resorts are recognizing that if they don’t reach out to people of color, they’re going to be losing a lot of business,” Moreno said.

The resorts have sculpted terrain parks — essentially skate parks for snowboarders — which come closer to the experiences of big-city kids, said Jensen, co-president of Vail Resorts Mountain Division, which includes the four Colorado resorts and Heavenly Valley at Lake Tahoe.

“They have a very urban feel,” Jensen said. “That connection is easier for people to make than putting inner- city kids on skis.”

And it’s that connection — that moment when someone realizes this is something they love — that resorts are trying to build. Once new customers are hooked, they’ll put in the effort — and the money — to come back, resort representatives said.

It worked for Dietrich Goodwin, a Fresno senior who went snowboarding with the Sierra Summit program.

“Yeah, I’ll come back,” he said. “The speed you catch coming down the mountain — it’s kind of like skateboarding, the turning, everything, but you can go so much faster. It’s cool.”

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