Accusations fly over Wolf Creek
Group alleges back-room dealings between Forest Service, developer

A sign welcomes visitors to the Wolf Creek Ski Area. Ongoing controversy over a proposed development that would put more than 2,000 new homes on a 300-acre parcel heated up this week, with opponents scoring the release of previously withheld Forest Service documents. The documents, they say, will shed light on back-room dealings between the Forest Service and developers, Red McCombs and Bob Honts./Photo by Todd Newcomer.

by Will Sands

Allegations of backroom dealings are currently hovering over Wolf Creek Pass. A watchdog group has accused the Forest Service of being in bed with the developers proposing a ?Vail-sized city? at the base of the Wolf Creek Ski Area. The development?s proponents flatly deny the allegations.

The Village at Wolf Creek is not directly tied to the Wolf Creek Ski Area, which is widely recognized as an environmentally friendly, no-frills, family-run operation. However, a Texas development company, funded by former Minnesota Vikings owner and Clear Channel Radio baron Red McCombs, has proposed a massive development near the ski area. McCombs and his partner, Village at Wolf Creek CEO Bob Honts, would like to develop 287.5 acres of meadow just east of Wolf Creek Pass and at the base of the Alberta chairlift.

The Rio Grande National Forest is studying a proposal by McCombs to build 2,172 housing units and 222,100 square feet of commercial space. As part of the plan, 12 restaurants, several hotels and a convention center also would be built on the meadow. Opposition to the Village at Wolf Creek has been off the charts.

?This is a ridiculous development proposal,? Jeff Berman, executive director of Colorado Wild, has said. ?Trying to put a city half the size of Durango on less than 300 acres, at 10,300 feet of elevation and at the snowiest place in Colorado makes no sense whatsoever.?

The Durango-based environmental watchdog group has now alleged collusion between the Forest Service and the Village at Wolf Creek. Based on the recently released information, Colorado Wild is crying foul play.

?Red McCombs and his attorneys are writing federal policy without any knowledge of the public,? Berman said. ?They?re doing whatever they can to exert political pressure, and we?re now demonstrating that pressure.?

On June 23, Colorado Wild sued the Forest Service for failing to release records related to the Village at Wolf Creek and violating the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Based on newly released documents, Berman said a suspicious relationship exists between McCombs and Honts and the federal agency.

?We?ve suspected the Forest Service was in bed with McCombs? and his development manager Bob Honts all along,? he said. ?They?ve been stonewalling us for years, withholding documents that should have been available publicly from day one.?

Berman cited a March 11, 2004, letter from the Forest Service establishing limited, seasonal-use access to the parcel for the developer. That letter was a key 4 component of the developers? June 14, 2004, application for final approval by the Mineral County commissioners. The letter also was ghost-written by McCombs? attorney and lobbyist and signed by the Forest Service, according to Berman.

Chairs for Wolf Creek?s Alberta Lift await ski season in a meadow at the base of the ski area earlier this summer. Red McCombs and Bob Honts are proposing more than 2,000 homes and 200,000 square feet of commercial space on private land near the base of the lift. The plan is opposed by environmentalists and the ski area?s owners./Photo by Todd Newcomer.

?This very critical document was essentially written by a developer and signed by the Forest Service,? Berman said. ?I can?t hand letters to the Forest Service and ask them to sign them as federal policy. These developers apparently can.?

As a result of Colorado Wild?s FOIA suit, the Forest Service will release hundreds of more pages of withheld documents by Oct. 7. The group expects these additional pages to further detail a dirty relationship.

?More information is coming out daily on what?s really going on here,? Berman said. ?And it?s only because we forced the Forest Service to open its files and show the public what?s really going on.?

Brad Bartlett, attorney for Colorado Wild, said that he anticipates a landslide of evidence that the agency and developer have been engaged in unethical and illegal dealings. ?We believe this is just the tip of the iceberg,? he said. ?Based on the limited information we?ve obtained so far, we suspect that the developer and the agency have probably been working together behind closed doors for years without any public input or scrutiny.?   

Bob Honts, Village at Wolf Creek CEO, denies outright any suspicious behavior on his or the Forest Service?s part. Rather than writing federal policy, he said his and McCombs? attorneys have merely been involved in the federal process.

?If a property owner is unable to have his attorney work with attorneys from the U.S. government, what has this democracy come to?? Honts asked.

Village at Wolf Creek attorneys did comment on the Forest Service letter, Honts said. However, he countered that the dealings were negotiations, not attempts to influence the agency or write federal policy.

?An agreement was being drawn up by the Forest Service attorney,? he said. ?Our attorneys looked at that agreement and commented on it. If you?re buying a house, you want to have an attorney look at the contract. The same is obviously true with this larger proposal.?

As Oct. 7 approaches, Honts is not concerned about the Forest Service documents seeing daylight. He said that Colorado Wild will find more Village at Wolf Creek involvement in the process, but only in an above-board fashion.

?They?ll find a lot of cases where we negotiated with public agencies,? Honts said. ?We have the right to make comments and ask for certain points of agreement that might be in our interest.?

Honts concluded by saying that the charges of collusion are way off base. ?I would suggest that the word ?collusion? is a terrible misrepresentation of what happened,? he said. ?In this country, citizens have the right to appeal to their government. That?s not collusion. That?s democracy.?

Berman and Colorado Wild take a different view of the situation. ?The Forest Service is doing the bidding of Red McCombs,? Berman said. ?We?ve known this for a long time, and now the proof is starting to come out.?