BRAINSTORMING.......

Ok....we have been throwing ideas around for a long time about a new patrol room.....I would like to get this all down on paper, so that we do not overlook any possibilities.

So let's hear it...what are your thoughts on the requirements of our next patrol room??

• LOCATION..new building? move existing? use an existing facility???
• AMENITIES..treatment room requirements? locker room? family area? hot tub?
• REQUIREMENTS..ski-in/out? ambulance access? parking?

Don't hold back...lets get every idea, no matter how far-fetched, out on the table.....who knows what the ultimate result will be, but the more input the better..

Also, keep in mind how we can sell these ideas to management...specifically how they will make Boyne a better/safer/more enjoyable ski experience for our guests.

Please use the reply button below to add your comments, rather that starting a new post...easier to track that way..

Great Meeting!

WoW!
Now THAT was a season kick-off meeting!

August 10

I will be missing out on the Wallon Summer Party, but I'm up for working on Sunday. What time do we get started?

Auxillary treatment facility

excellent suggestions

I strongly support the comments sent in by Mike and Todd. Excellent thoughts by two guys who have obviously considered these issues for a long time. My own less-informed take on some matters raised:

Uniforms

This is not a big issue for me. I would prefer that we not adopt a uniform that's hard to replace or expensive. It's probably easier just to go with the standard red and white knowing that we'll always have a supply available.

Organizational Structure.

I really liked Mike's suggestions. The only problem is that the Patrol Director so far has been working 7 days a week. That position will have to be obviously someone local to the hill and retired. I don't know how Audie has done it, but it would be way more then I could ever see undertaking. Its really going to have to be a management call. On the other positions, I'd recommend that the terms be staggered so there's an overlap of seniority. Mike: Did you intend there to be an automatic move up the chain? In other words the team leader automatically takes over the APD position after his term is up?

New Patrol Room

One of the problems with the snowmobile situation is the patrol room location and size of the hill. When we were at the civic centre, you could take the toboggan right to the patrol room half the time and a snowmobile wasn't usually needed! If we do get moved and can get back to the centre of the hill, this may reduce some of the stress on the snowmobile issue. Conversely, if we're back out in no man's land again having two reliable snowmobiles is a key problem. Same thing with the radio problems. Location of the patrol room impacts so many issues.

I also second the suggestion that we look to Otsego for an awfully nice patrol room. I'd kill for a locker set up like they have in their basement.

Finally, I echo the comments about how the grass really isn't greener over on the other pasture. Many other patrols are holding fund raisers just to buy bandages. We should count our blessings.

Otherwise I support Mike and Todd's comments and suggestions fully.

Bob

R.E. Noel's e-mail

Well it sounds like Noel wants to know what the general membership would like them to discuss at the upcoming meeting with management. While it may be somewhat premature to get into all of the issues that we have thrown around to date in this forum, I would encourage a dialogue on the following;


PATROL ROOM

• It is rumored that the land at the bottom of Meadows has been sold. What affect if any will this have on our current situation? What is the long term outlook for remaining in our current location?
• If we stay there what is the possibility of moving the lift-op's out so that we may use the entire building?
• If we are to move what are the options? is our old location going to be available now that the child care is moving out? is ambulance visibility really a major concern (enough to out-weigh customer convenience?)

SNOWMOBILES

• Can we get a commitment for at least one new machine this year?
• What might our options be for a patrol-owned machine?

PATROL LEADERSHIP

• It has been suggested that in the future, we change the way our patrol leadership is selected and how they serve. what is managements feeling on this?
• How does management foresee the relationship between the paid patrol and the NSP?

UNIFORMS

• What is managements feeling on our current uniforms?
• Would Boyne be willing to share in the cost of developing / supplying a new patrol uniform?

FUND RAISING

• Would Boyne be willing to donate passes to the patrol as a fund raiser?
• Could the Patrol place vending machines at Disciples Ridge as a fund raiser?

MEMBERSHIP

• What does management think of the idea of expanding the roster?

These are just a few thoughts....... hopefully more of you will have ideas to post....lets hear it!

P.S. I am glad to hear that the toboggans have been scheduled for refurbishment..count me in for the work bee!

Plan of Approach

There are a number of issues I believe need addressing and some of the blogs posted to date address this. I know for a fact that Boyne Mountain does in fact value the service of it's volunteer patrol so let's make sure that as todd has stated that the value we add continues to be recognized by Boyne Mgmt. As a volunteer organization, the issues we face at a local patrol level are no different than those faced by any other patrol in the national organization. The difference in how those issues are managed is more a reflection of the patrol leadership than the leadership of the sponsoring ski area management. I consider it a privilege to be a part of the boyne organization and not an entitlement and hopefully we can stay focused on that mindset.

Having said that, there are a number of opportunities that if addressed properly by our leadership, and with the right structure can be resolved with little or no financial investment by Boyne. Todd is correct in stating that Boyne mgmt has been and continues to be very supportive in ensuring that we have the proper equipment essential to the execution of our mission. If one took the time like I have to visit other areas in our section, region, and division I can tell you that we are 90% better off than most patrols.

What I feel we lack is a defined plan of approach on how to sustain a quality level of service to an organization (Boyne Mountain) that is in a progressive state of growth. How we have been lead in the past will be sufficient to sustain the level of service Boyne will expect as it continues to grow. What I would like to outline is several of these issues that might perhaps serve as a foundation of a plan that could be used as a roadmap to the future.

1. Membership: The demand on patroller's and their families are much different than they were 10 years ago. Perhaps the requirement of every other weekend is to much. The additional nights required to ski can be a real hardship if folks need to take vacation on a Friday to drive up to work a 4 hour shift. We cannot sustain with a patrol level of 40. If we increased membership to 60 or 70 and had the requirement of every third weekend and 3 nights that might solve the problem. We could experiment with flexible shifts but we would need to talk with other areas that do this to understand the problems they encounter and how they deal with that.

2. Equipment: There are a number of concerns here; Old lift evacuation ropes with the improper pulley ratios, toboggans that are in need of replacement, Old and potentially unreliable oxygen regulators, traction splints in need of repair or replacement, un-reliable radio communication to disciples ridge, snowmobiles that are unsafe and unreliable for operations, BP cuffs that don't work. These are not new concerns but concerns that have been around for several years and have not been properly addressed. A solution to this was alluded to by John Bennett, I know that Boyne will donate 4-6 season passes that we can raffle. I would give each patroller 10-15 tickets to sell. We would use the proceeds from these sales to finance a capital management maintenance/replacement program. For example, if we have 40 patroller's selling 10 tickets each at $100 per ticket it would generate $40,000 annually. With these funds we could then start a defined capital replacement program that would buy 1 new snowmobile every 3 years, replace 2 toboggans every year, replace lift evacuation equipment as needed, and upgrade our radio communication ability, etc.

3. Operations: I would suggest a leadership team that was comprised as follows:
1 patrol director, elected by the patrol and approved by management. This be a 3 year position with no term limits.
1 Assistant patrol director, again elected by the patrol and approved by management. This would be a 3 year position with no term limits.
2 team leaders, appointed by the patrol director, 2 year rotating assignment, renewable
1 capital manager, appointed by the patrol director, 2 year rotation assignment, renewable
1 hill trainer, appointed by the patrol director, 2 year assignment, renewable
1 lead off-hill trainer, appointed by the patrol director, 2 year assignment, renewable

This structure would ensure accountability, control, and commitment. An annual capital plan would have to be approved by the patrol at the annual meeting with a majority vote. Job descriptions would be written for each of these positions. This committee would meet formally monthly from November thru March and have a planning session in August for the upcoming year.

4. Uniforms: As much as I like the rusty parka, the reality is that we are the only patrol left in the region wearing them and I would guess less than a handful of patrols nationally. Our sister resorts within the Boyne family are all red/white and it is only a matter of time until we are required to change. We might be proactive on this and come up with a jacket that is more fashionable than the Red/White. Perhaps a small team to do some research on what other areas are doing and come up with a recommendation might be appropriate.

5. Patrol Room: It is just a matter of time before our existing patrol room is demolished. We should be talking with Ed/Dave to either integrate into the new day lodge design or come up with an independent design and location to build one. We have the skill set within our patrol to do this. The Otsego patrol room might serve as a starting design. What is critical is a basement that contains lockers and is family friendly. This would also allow us to re-vitalize the socialization of the patrol and would allow for the weekly Saturday morning meetings.

6. Training: We have perhaps one of the best on the hill training programs in the region and everyone in the patrol benefits from this ongoing activity. However, off the hill training is non-existent. We have several qualified OEC instructors on our patrol that are underutilized. When we recruit, we are dependent on other downstate patrols to provide this training in the off season. I would propose that we run our own OEC classes on Sunday mornings during the season. This would help with our recruiting efforts and ensure that we are teaching to Boyne Mountain patrol standards. Additionally, we should have quick interactive refresher sessions at the Saturday morning meetings. This would allow each of us to stay current with equipment, we could also review past accidents to determine what we could do better in the future.

7. Diversity of the patrol: It is no secret that for years we have had trouble retaining a diverse patrol. The reasons are varied but unfortunately we have a reputation of not being female and/or minority friendly. In the future this has to change and a strong leadership team is required to make this happen. Another aspect of diversity is our current requirement that if you don’t make ‘senior’ in 2 years you are asked to leave. I would challenge that we should be flexible enough to allow both basic only and auxiliary patrollers. There are many who have a strong medical background that would be happy only working in the patrol room, perhaps we need to re-visit the ‘mix’ of patrollers we want and determine how this would fit into the mix.

In summary, my view is that this is not just about two many night patrol duties, bad snowmobiles, or ‘Boyne’ not doing enough for us. Boyne does plenty for us. Perhaps we need to honestly look inward to determine what the root cause of some of the perceived problems are and be proactive to solve our own internal problems before seeking solutions elsewhere.

This past ski season was perhaps one of the best for snow in the past 10 years, but this is the only year that I can recall so many open slots in the duty roster. Perhaps we should do a root cause analysis on this.

Mike Costa

Boyne Update

WOW! Things are happening at a very un-Boyne like pace in the moving of the old One Water Street Restaurant....the building has been cut into three sections and is up on the moving dollies, while over at the Mountain the foundation is complete and ready...(it is just to the south of the magic carpet where the old 'par three" garage used to be....and if you know what that is you've been around for a while).....

The chairs are all off the meadows lift and rumor persists that the high speed Heather lift from the highlands will be erected there this summer...

The word is that all of the land at the bottom of Meadows has been sold to a third party developer for a new condo development.....no word on the patrol room though.....maybe we should just reserve one of the new condos????

Value Added??

It is good to see a dialogue beginning on the future of our patrol....

It seems that much of the recent thought revolves around the benefits (or lack thereof) that we as patrollers receive from management. Already there is talk of asking for more (patrol room improvements, snowmobile, discounts...while doing less (night skiing, non-patrol hill duties)....I guess it is human nature to want to maximise gain while minimising effort, but before we approach management with out list of requests (demands?) we should look at things from their perspective.

Why would they want to spend extra money & resources on the Ski Patrol?

What do we bring to the table that increases revenue, decreases work load (especially as perceived by the decision makers), enhances the customer experience, and generally promotes business at Boyne Mountain???
In short, are we a "value added" department??

I believe that we are, and that it should be a relatively easy matter to put together a "features and benefits" list that we can take to management as a tool to use in our negotiations.....the stronger the case we make for being a "value added" organization, the easier it will be for management to justify additional expenditure to support us.

We should also be cognisant of what the "pay scale" is for other patrols...I think that we may surprised to find that we are already on the upper end.....many patrols are having bake sales and ski swaps just to pay for their first aid supplies.....

I also do not think that management can be blamed for some of the problems that we are concerned with now. There is no reason for our patrol room to not be top notch...no matter where they put us. Have we been turned down in any request for cleaning supplies?? how about paint?? When was the last time we had a mandatory work bee to spruce up the patrol room?? As a medical care facility why do WE still allow the pros to smoke inside?? Do we have a scheduled maintenance program or minimum checklist for our toboggans??(they are embarrassing). When was our last Saturday morning meeting?? Exc..Exc..

I am not judging here, and I'm as guilty as anyone else of letting things slide and accepting it....I just think that before we start blaming Boyne for everything, we should look through our own house first. Lets get things polished up, get some regiment, pride and efficiency back into the organization...if we don't want to work so many nights, then lets get going on some serious recruitment to build our numbers and lighten the load....that way when management asks us to cover extra nights, or help out in other ways, we can do it easily & with a smile...That's "value added" and it will further our cause much better than stomping our foot and refusing to work nights.....

Many of you are business owners or in management positions...which of your employees get more of what they want.....the go-getter's who handle every challenge with a smile and maximum effort, or the whiners who respond to each request with a scowl and a heavy sigh??

Lets not be whiners...we need to clean our own house, build our ranks, buff things up, AND THEN......we can go to management, show them VALUE we ADD to Boyne Mountain, and lay our requests on the table.

Not to say we should not be advocating our position in the meanwhile, let's keep pushing for our old patrol room back, and newer sno-mos...we need to keep these concerns in front of management, and at the same time work ourselves back into a stronger bargaining position by becoming a VALUE ADDED asset to Boyne.

Hmmmmm...seems I've rambled enough for now...more rants to follow.....

skidog

skidog aka...Mike Durbin, probably should have picked old dog instead, I think we all agree that there are some problems that need attention so I guess its good we are starting some dialogue.
Thanks Todd!

Night Patrolling

Night patrol duty staffing has always been a problem. Only a very few of us have wanted to do it. The Friday & Saturday night responsibility is a legacy from the Pritchard days when it was decided that the NSP would cover from the end of the Friday work day until Monday morning work week start. This was workable when the Night Skiing schedule was limited to starting Christmas week through St. Patricks Friday night. I think with the increased schedule it is just to much to expect our small patrol to cover. I have suggested that we should adjust our coverage responsibility from Saturday morning through Sunday night at 4:30pm plus MLK & Presidents Weekend Sunday nights. That is probably doable until we can re-grow the patrol's roster unless we would like to get out of night patrolling responsibility all together.

priorities

Doug: I agree with all of your suggestions or wish list. If we hit management with all of these, they may be overwhelmed. Perhaps we should prioritize them and decide which is the most important. That way we can focus on issues that we have a real chance of succeeding on.

For me personally, I'd set the top three items on your list as:

1. reduce night patrolling (3 is way more then enough for those of us who are non-locals)
2. better snowmobiles (my rotator cuff is just about shot)
3. improved patrol room facilities

The bottom line though is that I think the patrollers are getting the feeling that we're second class citizens, ranking in importance to somewhere in between a first year lift op and the guy that directs traffic in the circle. Its especially tough to hear stories about how Highlands gets this or that and we don't (assuming these stories are true). This certainly leads to resentment by the patrollers. I realize we're not revenue generating, but we need a certain level of support from management to be successful at what we do. If we don't have the tools, it makes life frustrating.

I for one talk up the hill all the time to skiers and non-skiers alike. I always recommend Boyne to people looking for a vacation outing. I like to think that although we are not directly revenue generating, the public certainly likes to see us there and we're a strong source of goodwill to the hill.

Bob

Recruiting idea

Good summer to all.
An idea to show our need of new patrollers. Allow us a information tent during a couple weekends, similar to the ski demo tents & location. I feel there are people who would like to join, but just don't know how to get started. This would bring us to them sorta speak.

Blog Etiquette

Welcome Boyne Mounties!
This blog has been provided as an open forum for sharing ideas, concerns and yes, even gossip as it pertains to the Boyne Mountain National Ski Patrol. I think that if used properly, a blog can be a very valuable tool in uniting an organization such as ours, where the opportunity to get everyone together for discussion is rare. There are however, a few basic ground rules to follow, and some things to keep in mind.....

• Treat this as an open meeting...... do not post things that you would not say in person.
• Do not post anonymously.....you can use a screen name, but we want to know who you are....if you're not willing to own up to it, don't post it!
• This blog is closed.......Only members can post or comment, but it is in the public domain...use your best judgement on your comments.
• Keep it positive......criticism is easy, but positive suggestions make better reading.
• Learn about Blogging.......it's kind of fun, & there are a lot of tools to use. When you make a post you can add photos, change text & fonts and even include video clips...get creative. E-mail or give me a call if you have a problem..todd@northernwrights.com (231) 582-5050

But perhaps the most important thing that you can do is check in and use this resource. Post and comment often...remember, this patrol belongs to ALL of us....let's ALL participate.

Doug's Opener

Hello Patrollers,

Earlier this year, Audie, Noel & I talked about Todds offer to use his blogging knowledge to set up this tool and allow we members of the Boyne Mountain National Ski Patrol to discuss concerns, problems and possible solutions for our patrol.

Audie, Noel and I are planning a meeting with Ed Grice and Dave Newman this summer to present possible improvements to the way that our patrol functions. We need your constructive input so we can present to them the most comprehensive list of things that need attention.

The following is a partial list of concerns that I have heard recently:

Re-build our most valuable asset, camaraderie.

Retention & Recruitment of Boyne Mountain NSP members.

Less night patrolling assignments per patroller.

More reliable snowmobiles.

More consistent discount privileges at Boyne Mountain.

More patroller training & refreshment of BMNSP policys & procedures.

Improve the appearance of the patrol room.

Possible new location site of the patrol room.

Refurbishment of patrol equipment & toboggans.

More consistent attendance or substitutes by patrollers.

Increase dollar value of meal voucher.

Possible fundraising efforts.

Lockers for patrollers at patrol room (future patrol room).

I am sure that there are some items that I have missed, but this is where all of you and this blog come-in. Please post your concerns and possible solutions. I have ideas on some of the items listed above and will post them in the future.

Thanks in advance for your participation.

Doug