GAINING ACCESS

More and more organizations are working to make skiing accessible to populations that have been under-represented and to help competitors reach the highest echelons. While there are many organizations that focus on providing access to outdoor activities of all types, the following three have a focus on snowsports and on Vermont.

freestyle rider LJ Henriquez, 14, and Stratton Mountain School alpine ski racer Michael Bronson Culver, 16, who placed first at a Junior National Slalom at Sunday River in December 2022. To find out more about the National Brotherhood of Skiers and its clubs. Nbs.org

Chill Foundation

Unlikely Riders

The National Brotherhood of Skiers

More than just an organization that brings together its Black ski clubs, the National Brotherhood of Skiers has been leading the conversation on Black ski culture for nearly five decades. Ten NBS-affiliated clubs operate out of major cities throughout the Northeast. Their events, such as the Thrill Seeker’s Winterfest, bring together Black skiers and riders for a weekend of celebrating on snow. The NBS and its affiliated clubs have also helped support 45 aspiring young athletes. Team NBS’s current athletes include several at Vermont academies, including Okemo Mountain School’s

Burton founder Jake Burton Carpenter and his wife Donna helped launch the Chill Foundation in 1995 at Bolton Valley Resort. The Burlington-based organization started with a focus on getting inner-city youth access to snowboarding. It has since expanded to include other board sports and now has programs around the U.S. and in 7 other countries. In 2021, it served 369 youth, of which 39% were white or non-Hispanic, 22% Hispanic and 20% Black. Chill.com

A recent addition to the snowsports landscape in the Green Mountains, Unlikely Riders works “to encourage all Black, Indigenous, and People of Color to engage in fun, radical joy and offers support to find healing through the mountains.” The group has held weekly gatherings for BIPOC skiers at riders at Cochran’s Ski Area in Richmond as well as events at other ski areas around the state. In 2021, the organization worked with Burlington retailer Outdoor Gear Exchange and other Vermont-based companies to send out 90 “Welcome to Winter” care packages (which include things like Darn Tough socks, Gordini Gloves and UnTapped Maple products) to community members. Unlikely Riders also helped provide 360 days on snow at 19 ski area at no cost, as well as gear and clothing. Unlikelyriders.com accessibility problem. There is also a cultural belief that snowboarding is for white people. As a leader in the industry, we can help change that. By inviting people who influence global culture into our world, we can shift this perception – hence the name ‘Culture Shifters’.”

Fifty years ago this spring, an even bigger party came to Aspen. In 1972 , the leaders of two ski clubs, Ben Finley of the Four Seasons West Ski Club of Los Angeles and Art Clay, Trip Director of the SnoGophers Ski Club of Chicago got together and started to plan what is now known as “The Summit.” They would invite 13 ski clubs from around the country “to identify and discuss problems and subjects which were unique to the Black skiing population, ski and socialize,” said Finley. More than 350 skiers showed up from clubs ranging from New York to Seattle.

“It was the time of the Black Power movement, and we were very uncomfortable telling Aspen that we were bringing a large Black contingent to town,” Finley said in an interview with Outside “In the months before we gathered, each individual club made their own reservations, thereby staying invisible to the Aspen Chamber of Commerce.” Two days before the event, though, the Brotherhood sent out a press release. The governor of Colorado put the National Guard on standby in case of violence.

The Summit became a giant party, with dancing in the streets, ski races and liquor sponsorships. Early on, one club showed up in

First Person Mirna Valerio Williston, Vt.

An ultra-distance runner, blogger and sought-after public speaker, Mirna Valerio is the author of the memoir, A Beautiful Work in Progress and the blog, Fat Girls Running. In 2020, she moved to Vermont. She learned to ski in 2021 and is an ambassador for brands such as Lululemon, LL Bean, Leki, Coalition Skis and Vail Resorts.

As a kid in New York City, I knew about gymnastics because that is what I saw when I watched the Olympics. I knew about Nadia Comaneci and I wanted to be a gymnast. I wasn’t really aware of skiing until I went to middle school and my school offered ski trips, but we couldn’t afford them. That’s when I sort of became aware of the sport and I knew that it was just not affordable.

Later, when I began working as a Spanish teacher at these very wealthy schools, I’d hear kids say that’s what they did on the weekends or that’s how they “wintered;” ‘We went to Park City” or “We went to Vail.” Those places and skiing were all just kind of vague, nebulous ideas in my head.

I became curious as an adult and got to try skiing a few times in 2010 or 2011 in New Jersey. And then I got to try cross-country skiing in Aspen – I think that’s the whitest thing I’ve ever done. It was uphill and at altitude and exhausting.

It wasn’t until I moved to Vermont 10 years later and took a lesson at Sugarbush in January 2021 that I began really pursuing it. Jen Gurecki from Coalition Snow, a brand of women’s skis, reached out and got me skis. The next year, I was offered a season pass and a series of lessons at Bolton Valley Resort with a great instructor there, Guy Williamson and he gave me a whole plan for progression.

I got so strong and confident that by the end of the season, I could say: “I’m a skier!” I love trail running and mountains and this gave me another way of moving my body.

Vail Resorts contracted with me to be an ambassador so now I’m skiing at Okemo and Stowe and taking lessons there too. I’m addicted and I’m skiing every time I can. I keep my ski gear in the car and every time I go someplace for a speaking engagement, I look to see where I can ski.

Because of the work I do, I have the fortune of usually not having to pay for anything. Skiing to me now means that all you need is representation and pajamas and the Pajama Party was born. The event grew and moved to different mountains. In 1993, nearly 6,000 came to The Summit in Vail. On February 4-11, the National Brotherhood of Skiers held the 50th anniversary in Vail. The theme: Soul on Snow.

More than just a party to unite Black ski clubs, the National Brotherhood of Skiers took on the mission of helping Black skiers and riders reach the top of their sport. It established an Olympic scholarship fund and began to send promising skiers and riders to ski academies. One of the NBS’s most successful recruits, Andre Horton, a downhiller from Anchorage, Alaska, was on the U.S. Team from 2001 to 2004 and was the first Black person to stand at the top of the podium at an FIS race in Europe. In 2004, he was fourth in the National Championships in Super G. Bode Miller was 12th. This year, another NBS athlete, Bronson Culver, a Stratton Mountain School student, won his first FIS race.

What has changed in the roughly 50 years between the National Brotherhood of Skiers’ first Summit and the Burton-sponsored Culture Shifters?

Ask some and they will say “A lot.” Ask others and they will say “Not much.” Nearly every Black skier or rider will say, “Not enough.” some kind of access. But if you don’t have $800 at the beginning of the season to get a pass are you really going to go?

I know there were probably programs when I was growing up but I didn’t know about them and it always felt inaccessible. The more I learn about programs like SOS Outreach, which is based in Colorado and operates in the West and Midwest, the more I realize the sport is becoming more accessible.

I think the more people see people like me and – I hate to use the word ‘influencer’— and other ‘possibility models’ showing that ‘this is for you too’ the more people will become curious and want to try it. Now you can go to places like Big Snow in New Jersey where you can take a bus there from the city and get a 2-hour ticket, complimentary lesson, and rentals for under $90.

For the most part, people in Vermont have been really welcoming and supportive. I was at one mountain with a lot of ‘ski bros’ – guys who have their own culture and think everyone’s a “Jerry” but I tried to ignore them. That’s a dying culture. You can’t be exclusive and not want anyone else in the sport because that’s not going to allow ski mountains to be what they are and grow.

Just seeing other Black and brown people on snow is making a difference. My mom, who is 65 has never, ever, been interested in skiing. But now she has repeatedly said to me in the past few months that she wants to try skiing. She’s the most city, urban, Brooklyn person ever. She said: “I want to know what it feels like to sliiiiide down the mountain.” I think we’re going to have to make that happen this year.

The numbers speak for themselves: 88.7% of snowsports participants at ski areas are white, according to the 2021/22 survey by the National Ski Areas Association: “Only 1.5 % identify as Black or African American. Asian or Pacific Islanders account for 5.7%, Latino and those of Hispanic origin make up 5.5%. Native, indigenous and “other” make up the remaining 2.2%.”

Nationally, roughly 14% of the population identifies as Black, 18.9% as Hispanic and 6.1% as Asian. Indigenous or ative (Hawaiian, Pacific Islander, Alaskan, American) account for less than 2%. In Vermont, a state which is 94% white and where fewer than 8,000 residents (1.5%) identified as Black on the 2020 census, those skier numbers are likely even smaller.

In 2019, the trade organization Ski Vermont sat down with members of regional NBS-affiliated clubs to see what Vermont’s ski areas could do better. Among the recommendations: hire more people of color in prominent positions, show more people of color in marketing communications, and invite groups to the mountains. Following that meeting, Magic Mountain became the first ski area to appoint a Black ski school director, Bobby Johnson — though Johnson no longer works there.

Perhaps the best-known Black voice in Vermont’s ski industry is that of Brian Hughes, the charismatic groomer formerly of Killington, now of Middlebury Snow Bowl, who is known for his video snow reports, which often end with “Don’t litter. Don’t ever let anybody harsh your stoke. Come on out, have a great day so that others may ski. Peace.”

But as Hughes and others have noted, overt and inherent racism are still present, if not rampant: a word etched in the iced windows of a gondola car at Killington; a filmmaker and snowboarder who is refused service at a bar in the Northeast Kingdom. These are just two recent examples. Ask any Black skier or rider and there will be other examples of systemic racism in

[First Person] Bobby Roberts Stowe, Vt.

Ellerson ”Bobby” Roberts grew up in Stowe and worked in the ski industry before launching one of Stowe’s longestrunning and most popular night clubs, The Rusty Nail. He also helped relaunch the Stowe Winter Carnival in the 1970s. He is now a realtor with Mountain Associates and is at work on a memoir, The Black Snowflake.

Growing up in Stowe some 50 years ago I was the only Black kid in school. In fact, I think I might have been the first Black kid ever at the Stowe school. We’d been living in New York, and then Boston , where my mom started dating a man who was a chef and wanted to open a restaurant in Stowe. She decided it was better for me to go to school in Stowe than back in the ghetto in Boston so we moved.

I started to ski in seventh grade with Stowe Friday school program. Of course, being a little Black kid from the city, I didn’t have skis but people donated stuff and everybody was so kind to me. I was sort of like a novelty, because back then you have to understand that we didn’t have cable so we didn’t see Black people robbing stores or with guns. It was harder for my mom. She was a very pretty, Black single woman and I think a lot of women in town felt threatened by her. She was unhappy and left Stowe when she finally couldn’t take it anymore. I stayed and lived with friends while I finished school.

It was easier for me. It’s funny; I think the racism thing in towns like Stowe sometimes goes the opposite way. People try so hard for inclusion. I remember my first year in high school, I was voted class president. No one even knew me.

Being a good athlete helped. I was the goalie on the soccer team and one of the best players on the

Vermont’s ski towns, and both conscious and unconscious bias.

As Miguel Reda, the manager for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at Burlington’s Outdoor Gear Exchange and a board member who leads an ongoing DEI workgroup with the Vermont Outdoor Business Alliance noted, “I went to the mountains over Martin Luther King weekend and the sad thing is people just think of this as a ski weekend, not as a weekend to honor a man who died combatting racism.”

If the culture is shifting, it’s a slow shift. u basketball team. But I didn’t get to be a great skier because I was working on those two other sports and hoping for a college scholarship.

We were a Catholic family and I’d walk to church on Sundays and one day when it was like 20 below The Stowe Reporter ran a picture of me walking there. Maria Von Trapp saw it and thought ‘Here’s this poor Black kid having to walk to church every day and nobody ever picks them up.’ She was very Catholic and reached out and that’s how I got to know her. She gave me a summer job working at Trapp Family Lodge gift shop during high school.

It was only once I started showing interest in girls that stuff would start to come out. Really interesting people whom I thought were the nicest people ever would come out with excuses why I shouldn’t date their pretty blonde daughter, like “We want her to date a lot of people.” If you wanted to get close to someone, that just wasn’t allowed.

I saw what my mom had gone through and early on, decided that I was going to be an ambassador and the best kid I could be. I went to college at St. Michael’s and then came back to Stowe and got into the bar business, first running the door, then as a manager and part owner of The Baggy Knees night club.

That’s also when I really got into skiing. I hooked up with some crazy good skiers like Tom Silva and Alec Sparks. I was more into freestyle stuff and we’d see who could jump further and flip harder. The three of us ran the NASTAR program one year and after the races we’d do these Chinese downhills from the top of Spruce Peak.

One year, a local shop asked us to sell their demo skis. This was before demo days were really big. We got a big ugly Dodge Power Ranger van and filled it with skis and defective sweaters and hats that Donna Moriarty gave us and we’d drive around to all the colleges and say “Hey, here’s a pair of skis you can have for $75.” We did really well.

Then USA Century Skis out of Colorado hired me to sell their new Kevlar skis. I got the baddest van ever with the best sound system I could find. It was a really fun time but my goal then was to save some money for grad school at St. Michael’s College.

When I came back to Stowe at the end of the season, I’d planned to go back to my old role at The Baggy Knees. But when I got back, the job and the money they had promised me wasn’t there. I was pretty down when I ran into Marvin Gamerhoff at breakfast at McCarthy’s one day. He became my mentor and helped me start The Rusty Nail.

There were a lot of really good people in the ski business back then but there were also a lot who were from Austria and Germany and who, let’s say, may not have signed up for what was going on after World War II. Many white people from Europe were very cautious about letting others into their sphere. I definitely had some run-ins.

I could have been mad about everything and a protester but I wanted to be the best person I could be. From early on, I made a conscious choice that I wanted to be an ambassador.

I don’t know if it was the right thing. In retrospect, maybe because of my popularity and notoriety with The Rusty Nail I could have been a bigger voice for people of color. Now, I see things happening in Stowe and wonder if I should have done more.

A friend of mine here in Stowe who adopted a little Black girl reached out a few years ago because his daughter was facing bullying and racism. This was in 2021. Stowe had to start a racial advocacy group to deal with that and other incidents. I was like ‘Seriously? In this day and age?’ Racism is out there and with the polarization of politics, you see it a little bit more. I see myself as a pretty outgoing guy but there are definitely some places I don’t think I would go on vacation.

Now I’m seeing so many of the workers here from Jamaica and Ecuador and other places. I talk to them and many feel like they are ‘just help’ — here just because other people don’t want to do their jobs. I’d like to think that’s not Stowe – that a lot of that comes from people who come here from outside of town. You can have money but still have ignorance.

With