Mountain Rider’s Alliance is a group of like-minded people dedicated to making a positive change in the ski area industry, as well as supporting the environment and surrounding communities. We believe riding is more than a sport, but rather a way of life.
MRA Founding Partners
Originally from the outskirts of Chicago Illinois, Dave Scanlan was enamored by skiing at the tender age of 9. Following his downhill passion into adulthood, his aspirations led him west, where skiing became his life, riding 200 days a year, and learning the trade of building chairlifts.
At the age of 22, with powder calling his name, he moved north to Hope, Alaska. His love for community and values-based entrepreneurial spirit helped him and his wife to create a successful community-supporting tie-dye shirt company, Glacier Dyeworks. Appreciating his forward thinking, the local people appointed him to the Hope and Sunrise Land Use Advisory Planning Commission. In June of 2006 he was elected by his peers as Chairmen of the Planning Commission, where he still serves today.
Dave’s first look into ski area development planning was in 2001, after seeing local business owners that he cared about struggling to keep their doors open due to a lack of winter business. In 2007, he was contacted by the Cooper Landing Chamber of Council president to assist in local ski area development to promote a stronger winter economy. These planning efforts led him to the current development plan in the Summit Lake Recreation Corridor, and his involvement with Mountain Rider’s Alliance in 2010. As a founding partner of MRA his collaborative spirit is monumental in formulating the groundwork needed to develop sustainable mountain playgrounds that support their surrounding communities.
In high school Jamie Schectman saw the movie “Hot Dog” and immediately recognized his life’s calling. At graduation when asked what he was going to do with his future, he responded, “Own a ski area!” He made good on his Hot Dog promise, moving to Squaw Valley and becoming a lift operator. He quickly realized the importance of working nights, switched to the coveted swing shift sandwich-maker position, and a path of 100-day seasons began.
Sandwich making turned into front desk detail and night audit for a small hotel at the mountain, which led to a position on the opening team of a 5-star hotel in 1990, where Jamie was promoted to Hotel Auditor and Night Manager at the age of 22. Furthering his community connections, in 1991 he became Treasurer of his Homeowner’s Association Board for three terms, and in 1995 he became a Certified Massage Therapist and created Therapeutic Thursdays at the local hospital. He was also a member of Tahoe Nordic’s Search and Rescue for three seasons.
As his passion for skiing deepened, Jamie became intimate with the Sierras. In 1999, he scored the dream job of a lifetime as office manager and tail guide for a first-year heli ski operation in Alaska. It was in that season that his love for the big mountains was forever solidified. This led him to living for five years in the Andes of Argentina where he and his wife first refurbished an old wine vineyard, the beginning of Jamie’s ongoing involvement with community-supporting businesses. They then relocated to Patagonia, developing a vacation rental business and several philanthropic projects to empower the local community. With first descents in both the Andes and Chugach, Shecky has a strong pioneering spirit. He is honored to serve on the advisory board for the Center for Sustainable Tourism.
Jamie is committed to leaving the world a better place than he found it and believes skiing can play a major role. As an Initiating Founding Partner of Mountain Rider’s Alliance, it is his dream come true to see the MRA global collaborative effort proving that great places to ski can also be stewards of our communities and environment.
Shanie Matthews began her love-at-first-site affair with downhill skiing in the Cascade Mountains at age 4. Her fascination with the sport turned into a lifetime passion that has taken her around the world, working in retail, as a ski instructor, on avalanche control teams, the race department, and as an on-mountain EMT supervisor. From the Sierras to the Alps, from the Chugach to the Andes, skiing taught Shanie the importance of being a citizen of the world with a focus on global sustainability, community stewardship, and environmental awareness. Beyond skiing, Shanie is a values-based entrepreneur and writer, advocating happiness with her website, My Happy Path.
MRA Advisory Board
Dr Jonathan Tay learned to ski on a Michigan ski hill at the age of 10. When the ski area was built, garbage was brought to the top of the hill to increase the vertical drop to 220′. That was enough, however, for him to find his passion for being outside and sliding on snow (ice, really). This passion that he was fortunate enough to discover at such an early age, has been the guiding light the rest of his life. All decisions he made from that point on have been based on the pursuit of skiing. His love for the mountain environment has taken him all over the world living and skiing, and finally settling down in proximity to Lake Tahoe and the Eastern Sierra since 1998, “I am a physician in Reno, NV. I am married to Monique, have a son (Alex) and a daughter (Megan) at home. Although I am not in the ski or environmental industry, I have been involved in business ventures in the medical field that is guided by one principle: do the right thing for the patient and community, and success will come.
I believe the ski industry should do the right thing for the rider, community, and environment, and success will come. I have been following the grassroots movement that is now Mountain Riders Alliance since the Shames Mountain Cooperative movement. I have since then shared the dreams and vision of the MRA and its founding members. I see the mountain culture and riding experience being diluted and degraded by corporate greed and a ski industry motivated by short term financial profit at the expense of community and environment. MRA has an opportunity to bring skiing and riding back to the ski industry. MRA has an opportunity to share the passion of skiing and riding with the world, at the same time setting an example of community and environmental stewardship. Let’s leave this world a better place than we found it, and have fun seeking big lines while we are at it!”
Hunter Sykes started skiing at the young age of 2 ½ while living near the base of Eldora ski area in Colorado. His passion for skiing and snowboarding has led him to 3 continents, 5 countries, more than 50 ski areas and numerous backcountry stashes. By the time he graduated from high school, he had been lucky enough to have lived –and skied- in Steamboat Springs, Aspen, Durango and Grand Junction, where he had his first ski job working on the ski patrol at Powderhorn ski area. After spending 2 years in the Coast Ranges of Southeast Alaska, he returned to Colorado and studied Ski Area Operations at Colorado Mountain College before embarking on a 20+ season career in the ski industry in Colorado and California, working jobs as varied as race crew, ski and snowboard instructor, ski repair technician, summer trail crew and in retail and rental management. He also worked for a time as the ski area research director for Colorado Wild and the Ski Area Citizen’s Coalition, a grassroots effort to promote environmental stewardship and sustainability within the ski industry.
Hunter has a BA in History from the University of Colorado, Boulder and an MA in International Environmental Policy from the Monterey Institute of International Studies in California. He has extensive experience working with private industry and non-profit organizations on a variety of environmental issues in the Americas, Europe and the Pacific.
He is also a founding partner of Coldstream Sustainability Group, a sustainability consultancy, and of Coldstream Creative, a film production company that produces environmentally and socially themed documentary films, including: Resorting to Madness: Taking Back Our Mountain Communities that addresses the impacts of the modern ski resort industry on mountain communities and environments.
Jeff Pensiero is a successful visionary within the ski industry, and a passionate skier that is able to connect dream, tenacity, and foresight into a successful package. As the founder and owner of Baldface Lodge in Nelson, BC, Jeff has created one of the most successful snowcat operations in North America. His extensive entrepreneurial skills and intimate understanding of the ski industry are welcome assets at the MRA roundtable.
Joe Turner started skiing at 2.5 years old and knew by the ripe age of 12 what his future entailed: owning his own ski area. To pursue his dream he began life as a ski racer in grade school and started up the first Ski & Snowboard Club at his high school, which he was president of until he left and migrated to Tahoe to snowboard after graduation. His passion for the outdoors took him to the waves to learn surfing, which diverted his love of snowboarding to telemarking. With a whisper in the winds calling him back to the mountains, Joe returned to his childhood dream place of Colorado, circa 1995. His adoration for the free heel boogie growing, he dedicated his life to telemarking. He developed his big mountain skills and took his passion to Jackson Hole where he organized and held the Telemark Extreme Skiing competition. The same year he ventured to Alaska to ski Haines with the first telemark crew to ever film in Alaska.
Joe’s has played many roles within the ski industry: Athlete, Professional Ski Patrol, Snowmaker, Event Organizer, Judge, Film Production and Ambassador for his sponsors just to name a few. Now a father of two, his interest revolves around family, being a professional telemark skier in the winter, and a horse trainer in the summer, a reality that he feels great gratitude for, “Passion of life has led me down many paths that I have been blessed to be able to experience. Overall skiing has directed my entire life as I look back. This is something that that I hope future generations can also enjoy, and why I am involved with MRA…to make our sport sustainable.”
John Kircher is second generation ski area management, having grown up in the business. When he was born his dad drove his mom halfway to the hospital in a slope groomer. From then on it was all downhill, working in all of the various sections of the ski and resort business including hotels and restaurants as well as the mountain operations and maintenance. Not counting those early years up to age 22, he’s been in the ski industry for almost 30 years on a daily basis. He is a principle in Boyne resorts which operates 9 ski resorts from coast to coast and one in Canada. In addition to daily duties as general manager of Crystal Mountain, he also oversees daily operations at the Summit at Snoqualmie, WA, Brighton, Utah and Cypress Mountain, B.C. He averages at least 110 days on skis!
Matt Hancock used to spend his Winters in climate controlled environments. A Converse High School All-American, a 3-time NCAA All-American, the 1990 NCAA Division III National Basketball Player of the Year, and two years professionally including a training camp with the Boston Celtics, Matt didn’t sport his first pair of skis until he was 18 and learned how to stop by running into the Mt Cranmore (NH) Base Lodge.
A College spring ski trip to Mammoth a few years later laid the groundwork for a career in the ski business. An avid outdoor enthusiast today, Matt is the Owner of the Mt Abram Ski Area – Maine’s soulful skier enclave.
Formerly, Matt was the President and CEO of Hancock Land Company. A 6th generation family business competing in acquisition and to-the-mill-gate management of mid-market timber properties. Matt initiated and oversaw Hancock’s entry into the Forest Stewardship Council – an independent NGO promoting the responsible management of the World’s forests.
Matt is a recent recipient of the prestigious Down East Environmental Award (the only recipient ever from a private business), the Governor’s Award for Business Excellence, and the Maine Biz Next Award “people shaping the future of Maine’s Economy”.
Matt serves as Treasurer to the Keep My Spirit Fund and the SO and Betty Hancock Scholarship Foundation, is the Chair of the Lake Region Youth Basketball League and is the former Chair of the Maine Association of Basketball Coaches’ Miss Maine Basketball Committee. Matt also coaches a 3rd and 4th grade and an 8th Grade AAU girl’s basketball teams.
In addition to Mt Abram, Matt manages his own real estate and investment portfolio. He is a graduate of Lake Region High School ‘85, Phillips Exeter Academy ’86, Colby College ’90, and Harvard Business School ‘04 and lives with his wife Tracy and three daughters; Sarah, Sierra, and Shauna in Casco, Maine.
Tom Winter: writer, photographer, pundit, consultant, columnist. Tom Winter has been a fixture in skiing for nearly his entire life. A former racer who competed in Europe and North America, and a ski mountaineer with first descents around the world, Winter is best known for his work as an editor, writer and photographer. The founding editor of the groundbreaking skiing title, Freeze, Winter currently contributes to and is published by every major skiing title. His work has also been featured in wide variety of other media outlets around the world, including the Los Angeles Times, ESPN, Outside, Frequency and others.
Currently Tom resides in Boulder, Colorado, where he is a founding partner of The Carve Collective, a wintersports lifestyle design agency, and the principal of Tom Winter Media, a wintersports marketing and public relations consultancy. You can follow him on Twitter @tomwintermedia.
MRA Team Members
Abbi Ness, MRA Contributing Writer, is a fifteen year old 9th grader that has been passionate about skiing since she started her gravitational journey on snow at the age of seven. She lives in Vancouver, Washington and skis at Mt. Hood. She enjoys playing soccer, and dancing, but skiing is her favorite.
Alex Kaufman, a MRA Marketing Consultant, started showing his dedication to skiing back in the 90s, living in a truck, and ski bumming it in the cold Colorado Rockies. Deciding to add a college degree to his repertoire, he later held a range of marketing and PR roles representing some of the largest corporate ski resorts during times of ownership change or recovering from mismanagement. With the dawning of 2010, Alex took a much needed break from the corporate regime traveling the country with his wife and daughter. During this same time he found MRA and connected with the passion.
Bryce Wilson, MRA Guest Relations Consultant, never kept secret his love and devotion to skiing and the mountains. As a toddler his family frequented Squaw Valley from his native hometown of Santa Rosa, CA. As soon as age permitted, Bryce found himself a permanent part of Squaw Valley’s operations from 1988 to 2002. In conjunction with work at Squaw, Bryce was also an integral marketing team member at Sitour and Couloir Magazine. Throughout the years, Bryce has acquired extensive knowledge in avalanche and safety awareness; mountaineering and backcountry exploration; grooming and re-vegetation/soil erosion. Bryce brings an unparallel enthusiasm for all winter sports, and a devotion to nature and its inhabitants. Bryce’s passion lies in assisting others and having an awesome time doing it.
David Geere , MRA’s Web Guru, is a website, social & mobile strategist based out of the UK. Outside of work, he carries a passion for all things technology and online based, and enjoys spending time with his Eurasier dog, Kai, racing in Formula Rotax as well as social engagements such as the Komedia, local music events and supporting community festivals and activities whenever possible.
Debbie Wilson, MRA Contributing Editor, loves being a part of a positive impact in the ski industry that is making a difference in the way our ski communities and mountains are respected. Assisting with creating visual pop from the molding of words, and streamlining the direct thought and factual information of MRA, Debbie’s prior experience in the formulation of engineering specifications provides for a strong attention to detail. Her enthusiasm, combined with her love of the outdoors, is a vital addition to MRA.
Doug Krause is an Operations Consultant for MRA. Doug has a passion for skiing forged from the age of two in the hills of Southern Vermont, cured in the Rocky Mountains and honed in the Andes, Chugach and San Juans. He began post-graduate skiing studies in Colorado in 1993 and has been an industry professional since 1999 working as a guide, avalanche educator, ski patroller and forecaster. Doug’s travels to all seven continents include nine seasons guiding and exploring in Argenina and Chile. He currently resides in Silverton, Colorado where he is the Snow Safety Director at the local ski hill and is working towards an MS in Software Engineering. Doug likes maté and fried pork products and dislikes gout and faceted cyrstals.
Erin Bragg, a MRA Project Coordinator, was born and raised in the shadow of the Chugach where she began skiing. Since then she has spent about a decade playing in the Wasatch, with trips to areas in the southern and northern hemispheres for both ski racing and the Freeskiing World Tour. She earned a BA from Bates College located in Lewiston, Maine and began working in Boston upon graduation. Realizing you can’t sacrifice one passion for another she moved back West. In the past year Erin received an MS from the Environmental Humanities Program at the University of Utah where among countless interests she looked into the year round impacts of dust on snow, the importance of place, and the cognitive benefits of spending time in nature. When she wasn’t reading or writing Erin was making hot laps down Baldy at Snowbird, slinging whiskey at High West Distillery, and volunteering for SheJumps, a Salt Lake City based non profit that aims at getting more women into the outdoors. She understands the importance of community and hopes that MRA can help rejuvenate and strengthen local areas by providing quality mountain playgrounds a town can be proud to call their own. This winter her main focus will be working with Mt. Abram to help create a new base lodge utilizing the most up to date ideas regarding sustainability and keeping all aspects of production as local as possible.
Grant Bowen, MRA Sustainability Consultant, grew up in southwest Michigan riding 300′ hills, playing ice hockey, wake boarding, and enjoying all outdoor activities. He headed out east for school and graduated with degrees in Business Economics and Organizational Studies from Brown University. After graduating he quickly moved to San Francisco to work for a small construction management company specializing in high end sustainable residential and commercial projects and to snowboard in Tahoe as much as possible. At night he scours the web for environmentally and socially conscious snowboard products and industry news to post on his blog snowboardgreen.com. During the winter he’s in Tahoe every weekend from opening day to closing day and keeps himself busy with surfing, soccer, and crossfit during the week. He recently earned his LEED AP.
Greg Seitz, MRA Contributing Writer, has spent his adult life in the Rocky Mountains. A passionate skier with a degree in wildlife biology, he has grown an interest in renewable resources, and interaction with the landscape in general. He graduates with an MBA from University of Montana in 2011.
MRA’s Sponsorship Consultant, Jamie Bianchini’s philosophy in life is “Live Big, Give Big, Love Big”. He lives big by following his passion of world travel and staying healthy by riding the globe on a tandem bike and sharing rides with strangers, promoting peace along the way under the title Peace Pedalers. He believes in a healthy balance of indulgence in our passions with contributions to society. Believing that every day is an opportunity to make a difference in the world, he tries to foster an extremely loving and giving attitude that balances his hedonistic side. This intention to be of service has manifested to numerous grassroots projects that have been formed with people and organizations from around the world, including MRA.
Jeremy Evans, MRA Concept Developer, is author of recently released book In Search of Powder: A Story of America’s Disappearing Ski Bum. While he admits that disappearing doesn’t mean “extinct,” he came away from his years of research rather saddened by the state of the ski industry and its current direction. Jeremy was appalled by rampant overdevelopment and connected with concerned ski bums living in ski towns in the American West, where ski bum culture was ignited and popularized. He learned to ski, embarrassingly enough, at Mount Lemmon outside of Tucson, Arizona. His breakthrough moment as a skier occurred at the age of 10, when he mustered up the courage to navigate the steeps and moguls of Mount Lemmon’s gnarliest runs – Hot Dawg and Lemmon Drop, which he now admits were never that gnarly and that he would be comfortable riding down both of them on a cookie sheet.
He eventually broke out of his shell, skiing other resorts in Arizona and even as far away as British Columbia. A competitive soccer player, he earned a scholarship to Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he yearned for the American West and grew tired of soccer and more interested in mountains. Upon graduating from Marquette with a bachelor’s degree in Journalism, he landed his first job out as a sports writer at the Nevada Appeal in Carson City, Nevada, where he quickly connected with somebody – anybody – who was willing to move to Lake Tahoe. It was there that he made the switch to snowboarding, and while he’s skied since being in Tahoe, he said snowboarding has an unfair advantage because his first real powder day was on a snowboard. He’s also an avid mountaineer, having climbed peaks throughout the American West and in Peru, Argentina, Chile, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Mexico. He’s a dedicated pass holder at Kirkwood and an English instructor at Lake Tahoe Community College. He’s also working on his next book about a group of surfers fighting to save one of the world’s best waves from an environmental disaster. As with In Search of Powder, he gravitates toward stories of concerned citizens who are passionate about something – climbing, skiing, surfing. It’s that connective process that allowed him to meet Jamie Schectman, who discussed MRA over pizza and beer on Tahoe’s north shore. He came away convinced from that meeting that he wanted to partner with an organization that values the very things he cherishes most – mountains and people who love mountains.
Jess Portmess, MRA Legal Assistant, is currently a law student at American University, Washington College of Law in Washington, D.C., and is dearly missing the mountains and her skis. She grew up a snowball’s throw from Song Mountain in central New York before studying at the University of Vermont where she balanced putting time in the books and on the slopes with pushing gear at the local ski shop. From the red-plastic skis in her yard in NY to the slopes of Mt. Mansfield in VT, skiing has always been a big part of her life. Jess fuels her love for skiing while sharing in the MRA vision for a sustainable future, and for now, it’s books on environmental law until she can get back to the mountains.
John Mletschnig, a MRA Operations Consultant, is an outspoken renegade of the modern “ski renaissance”. John’s opinions stem from his number one priority; to ski the best snow in the best terrain possible. He believes that everyone should have the opportunity to ski for skiing sake and that skiing and friends are what make the sport enjoyable and little else. John grew up skiing in New England, and has one of his earliest memories of his life skiing with his mom as a four year old in an area that is now a southern Vermont condo development. The University of (skiing in) Utah drew John west where he attained a degree in Geography. Based out of Salt Lake City he has continued to spend the majority of his adult life wandering about the Wasatch Mountains when not following work and play elsewhere. John has worked as a guide, patroller, forecaster, instructor and/or avalanche educator in Utah, Alaska, New Zealand and the Antarctic but formalized his opinions of the ski industry while working for several years managing ski patrol and snow safety programs of club ski fields in New Zealand. John also maintains the website and blog Utahbackcountryskiing.
Lyndsay Strange, MRA Contributing Writer, is a professional alpine ski coach and digital media production expert in the ski industry. She has most recently lived in Government Camp, Oregon, running the Reliable Racing store and representing the Bomber Ski, a brand new, handmade world cup race ski.
Mark Detsky, General Counsel, specializes in matters related to water, energy, electricity, transactions, corporations and real property into his practice. His clients include developers of renewable energy projects, governmental entities, private and non-profit corporations, as well as individuals. In 2004, he was attorney for the Amendment 37 campaign, which resulted in the first popular vote on passage of a renewable energy standard in the United States. Mark’s passion for skiing started in the low-lying Catskill Mountains of New York, and caused him to ski bum in Breckenridge during the 1990s. Now living in Boulder, Mark has successfully negotiated a powder clause into his work contract, and you can usually find him at his home areas north of I-70. Mark is interested in bringing the ski industry into the 21st century as net power producers, community centers and eco-tourism destinations. Originally from New York, Mr. Detsky is a 2003 graduate of the University of Colorado School of Law and a 1997 graduate of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.
Meaghan McKasy, MRA Contributing Writer, was born and raised in the Pacific Northwest, where the concept of respecting nature seemed to be in the subtext of everyday life. Growing up, weekends were spent skiing at Crystal Mountain and later Whistler Blackcomb. Meaghan moved out east to attend Boston College and earned a BA in Communication before realizing that she missed the west. Having spent time on both coasts, she chose Salt Lake City as her new home in order to attend the Environmental Humanities Graduate Program at the University of Utah (and ski a lot). She focused her Master’s thesis project on sustainable actions in the ski industry and hopes that one day soon the ski community will be a driving force behind addressing global climate change. Meaghan currently works for Utah Clean Energy with a focus on residential energy efficiency improvements.
Pete Blanchard, of the MRA Finance Development team, grew up ski racing at Stratton Mountain in Vermont. He studied history at Duke University in North Carolina then moved to the Bay Area after graduation. Spending the last 10 years between San Francisco and Tahoe, with as much time as possible in Tahoe during the winter, he felt a calling to connect his love for skiing with his day job. With a background in finance, he had a growing disillusionment with the ski industry itself and decided to link his passion for the outdoors and the mountains to his career path, leading him to enroll in the sustainability-focused MBA program at the Presidio Graduate School, based in San Fransisco. Currently half way through his studies, he is heading a student team that is working with MRA to assist in the development of the financial component of the MRA model.
Phil Sarnoff, MRA Contributing Writer, lives in Salt Lake City and is currently walking the fine line between ski bum and Ph.D. student at the University of Utah. Phil is researching the use of persuasive messages about climate change and how those can be utilized by the ski industry to influence the environmental attitudes of skiers and snowboarders. He also works for Salt Lake City in the Division of Sustainability.
Scott Johnson , MRA Development Consultant, moved to the Alps at the age of 21, and chose from that moment on to base his life around his ski habit. Over 25 years later, and his love for skiing is still as strong. As a small business owner in a ski community, he is concerned about the current direction that the majority of the ski industry is taking. Along with his wife, Suzi, they own and operate an ecologically-minded carpet cleaning business, Scott’s Carpet Care, based in Lake Tahoe, California. Known for his genius brainstorming, especially after midnight, Scott brings an immense amount of creativity and passion to the team.
Veronica Imbert was born and raised in the flatlands of Rosario, Argentina, and grew up swimming and playing field hockey at the local sports club. Athletic and energetic, she developed a strong passion for board sports and nature in her teenage years. In 2003, still searching for that “something else” in her life, and facing the economic crisis in South America, she applied for a work & travel visa at Squaw Valley in California, where she spent 5 winter seasons working as a lift operator and in retail stores and hotels for that precious season pass. As her love for the mountains grew stronger, the Andes called her back home where you can now find her riding in Patagonia or surfing the Atlantic Ocean. With a degree in Graphic Design and Visual Communications, her passion in life is to “spread the message, inform, inspire, and educate”. Her bubbling positivity is an integral part of our MRA community, bringing our verbal mission into visual eye candy.
