Blue Hills To Receive State Funds for Snowmaking Improvements
$2.2 Billion Environmental Bond Includes Earmark for Blue Hills Ski Area.
Sunday, August 17, 2014, NewEnglandSkiIndustry.com
Nearly two weeks after the House and Senate passed H4375, Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick signed the Environmental Bond Bill into law on Wednesday, August 13, 2014.
Under the environmental bond legislation, $2.2 billion will be borrowed and spent over a 4 year period.
Part of the law calls for $1.2 million in spending at the state-owned Blue Hills ski area. The ski area was most recently leased to Ski Blue Hills Management LLC in 2007, with a new 5 year term commencing in 2013. The ski area has long been saddled with exorbitant snowmaking municipal water costs due to not having a snowmaking pond. The $1.2 million earmark is to be spent "for the improvement, rehabilitation and expansion of facilities at the Blue Hills ski area in the town of Canton, including, but not limited to, the construction of a retention pond." It is not known when construction will commence.
Multiple earmarks will affect the greater Blue Hills area, such as $2.5 million for the Trailside Museum, $2.5 million for Eliot Tower and Blue Hills Weather Observatory, and $1 million for Broderick Stables.
