{"id":5135,"date":"2012-02-27T12:13:04","date_gmt":"2012-02-27T19:13:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/?p=5135"},"modified":"2012-02-27T12:14:01","modified_gmt":"2012-02-27T19:14:01","slug":"a-seasonal-ski-hill-is-one-idaho-countys-top-employer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/02\/27\/a-seasonal-ski-hill-is-one-idaho-countys-top-employer\/","title":{"rendered":"A Seasonal Ski Hill Is One Idaho County’s Top Employer"},"content":{"rendered":"

In about 30 minutes, outdoor winter recreators can escape the snow-less city of Boise and<\/del> find themselves in a winter wonderland.\u00a0 It’s the Bogus Basin Mountain Recreation Area.<\/del>\u00a0 Downhill ski slopes along with Nordic and snowshoe trails are\u00a0perched on the far southern end of Boise County, just across the Ada County line.\u00a0 It’s this seasonal ski hill that is Boise County’s top private employer.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Justin Marty \/ Flickr<\/p>

Bogus Basin Ski Area, outside Boise, Idaho<\/p><\/div>\n

<\/del>Bogus Basin employs on average 200 to 300 people each year.\u00a0 That’s according to data from the Idaho Department of Labor.\u00a0 To get the data, the department calculated the average number of employees between October 2010 and September 2011.\u00a0 So, it’s not always an accurate measure of what’s really happening.<\/p>\n

The general manager at Bogus Basin, Mike Shirley says the ski area hands out about 1,000 W-2s each year.\u00a0 That includes part time, temporary and full time workers.\u00a0 Shirley says Bogus Basin has just 35 full time, year-round employees.<\/p>\n

“We go from 35 year round employees to probably 700 in the wintertime,” Shirley says.\u00a0 “We run two or three shifts with all the grooming and everything and we\u2019re open day and night so we have at least two shifts of customer service, ski school, rental shop and everything that happens up there.”<\/p>\n

Shirley says it’s a unique situation, because Bogus Basin wouldn’t survive without the nearby cities across the county line like Boise, Meridian and Nampa.\u00a0 “I wouldn\u2019t bet any of them [employees] live in Boise County,\u201d Shirley says.\u00a0 “We really do have an anomalous situation with relying on Boise for our customer base and employment base and everything else.”<\/p>\n

Shirley wasn’t surprised when I called with data showing his ski hill is the top employer in the county.\u00a0 He says Boise County is in tough shape.\u00a0 It was once home to the largest city in the state, the county seat, Idaho City.<\/p>\n

That was back when gold miners struck it rich in 1862.\u00a0 Idaho City Chamber of Commerce Vice President Betty Banas says the miners made money fast, then most of them left town.<\/p>\n

“Within a few years of the strike, the gold had become harder to find and more difficult to mine. With fortunes no longer to be made, the prospectors left in droves.\u00a0 Fires also ravaged the community. The first, in 1865, wiped out eighty percent of the buildings in town. Others, in 1867,1868, and 1871, were similarly destructive.” – Idaho City Chamber of Commerce<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Jessica Pupovac \/ NPR StateImpact<\/p>

Click on the map to see the top five employers in Boise County.<\/p><\/div>\n

Canadian mining companies Mosquito Consolidated<\/a> and Atlanta Gold Inc.<\/a> are doing exploratory drilling in the area.\u00a0 Banas believes mining is about to make a come-back in her town. \u00a0“I think a lot of people hope it does,” Banas says.\u00a0 “But this town has been so pushed down \u2013 it hasn\u2019t got a lot of sparkle and hope.”<\/p>\n

The Data<\/h3>\n

Boise County’s population has fluctuated wildly in the last century.\u00a0 Census data estimates<\/a> Boise County’s population was more than 5,000 people in 1910, by 1960 just over 1,500 people lived in the rural county.\u00a0 It’s steadily increased since the 60s and today about 7,000 people live in the county.<\/p>\n

[spreadsheet key=”0AiLU6Cs5LWZIdGVZaUZHMDFuNDlNeWZPRVo3QlpRVXc” source=”U.S. Census Bureau\/Bureau of Labor Statistics ” sheet=0 filter=0 paginate=0 sortable=0]<\/p>\n

To see Boise County’s top five employers click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In about 30 minutes, outdoor winter recreators can escape the snow-less city of Boise and find themselves in a winter wonderland.\u00a0 It’s the Bogus Basin Mountain Recreation Area.\u00a0 Downhill ski slopes along with Nordic and snowshoe trails are\u00a0perched on the far southern end of Boise County, just across the Ada County line.\u00a0 It’s this seasonal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":5140,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[52,50,133],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5135"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5135\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}