Northstar

We Only Have One Side of the Story

The Sharp Edge today focuses on Northstar's Statement on the Shred Mom Incident
Wisconsin Skier Opinion. The Other Side Speaks

The ski resort Northstar is in the middle of a social media storm. Very reminiscent of the story from five years ago regarding Sunshine Village regarding a ski patroller being fired for ostensibly reprimanding a member of the owner’s family.

Shred Mom reports being physically assaulted in a liftline and the response of Northstar as being:

Northstar security told me that if I called police to the resort to report being assaulted, they would take my Vail Resorts Epic pass away permanently and that the police would be angry with me for bothering them. The next day, Northstar took my pass away anyway.

(When I filed a police report, the police officer told me he was extremely upset that Northstar would scare me into not calling the police, and that the resort tries to govern itself by not reporting assaults. The officer also said that he is called to Northstar resort ALL the time — that Northstar Resort keeps him in business — and that there is a group of men in their terrain park that he deals with constantly. There are obviously some major safety issues going on at Northstar, which explains why they don’t want more police at the resort. Because these issues were ongoing long before I was assaulted in their park, Northstar absolutely knew about the dangerous environment they were harboring. When I mentioned this to customer service on the phone, the customer service employee admitted Northstar has many problems with safety in their park, but said these things take time to fix.)

SOURCE: Shred Mom

I have yet to see any official word on this incident from Vail or Northstar.

Northstar — What Say You?

Northstar needs to do some explaining here, if their look into this matter shows Shred Mom’s story holds up people need to be fired and they need to apologize in a very public manner. Vail need not respond, but they had better make sure Northstar does.

I fully expect the guy who assaulted Shred Mom is more than just some local. I suppose anyone can drop the “do you know who I am” line but when you say that while assaulting a woman lends some credence the guy has something behind him to fill up his sense-of-entitlement tanks. Plus, if this guy has security cowed into covering for him it says something. This guy may not be all that big in the grand scheme of things but there is something there.

Northstar — Yes, We Do Need to Await Northstar’s Story

Similar to the Sunshine Village story we only have one story to go on, when there are three. Shred Mom’s, the guy, and Northstar has a story too. It is not just to pass judgement on the story based solely on one side’s story. Mind you judgement here is not necessarily a complete exoneration or condemnation of anyone. Waiting for the rest of the stories is not blaming the vicitm (as a number of exceedingly stupid FB reactions and comments have likened waiting for the other side to chime in) and it certainly is not akin to “rape-culture”. We are all due our day in court.

I also expect a quiet resolution to this story, one perhaps we will not hear about. I monitored the Sunshine Village situation for a while after it flared up and I don’t recall ever seeing a resolution one way or the other. I would guess there was a settlement including an agreement not to speak of the event publicly.

Northstar — The Public Relations Aspect

How does someone responsible for PR handle situations such as this? The Facebook jury is convicting Northstar without hearing from them and I’m quite certain most on the Facebook jury will not be swayed by anything Northstar releases. My guess is they will hunker down be quiet about it.

Facebook jurors very rarely risk legal jeopardy due to their inane comments. However, Northstar and Vail have no such luxury and need to make sure they are on solid legal footings with their statements and actions.

Shred Mom has filed a report with the local police department and that is where this matter will be settled, by a thorough investigation by the local LEOs. If they find Shred Mom’s story legitimate and recommend charges be pressed against the dude, then Shred Mom has reason to expect contrition from Northstar.

Corrections

  • March 24, 2015 6:12 pm US CDT
  • I dropped the “at Tahoe” when referencing Northstar as I have been informed that is no longer the resort’s official title.

Good Stuff!

4 Comments

  1. Northstar has not been named Northstar-at-Tahoe since Vail bought it a few years back. It’s Northstar California. It just kind of looks bad on your report here….

  2. Hello The Wisconsin Skier! Thanks for posting about this- hard to tell yet what actually happened, but… Please consider changing the picture you are using for “The Sharp Edge”, this one hurts my eyes, since someone is totally misusing the tool – the angle for bottom edge comes from the metal plate on which the diamond stone should lay and on this picture someone is just hurting their base with 0 deg…
    Cheers!

  3. Lisek, thanks for the comment. I don’t want to dismiss Shred Mom, but Northstar is coming off as more credible to me.

    Funny thing I was looking more closely at my “The Sharper Edge” image and noticed the stone was flat on the base as well. I’m breaking my macro gear out this evening (I hope) to shoot some photos for another (long past due) article and will grab my skis and see if I can get a good edge photo to replace it with. I truly appreciate you taking time for the comment and the helpful critique!

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