Change is afoot in the northern Gunnison Valley; few who live in Crested Butte would deny it. The roads are busier, construction is booming, and it seems that one major development after another is coming to fruition. But characterizing what was previously a gradual transformation to the steady acceleration of growth is difficult to quantify. Is it favorable? Foreboding? Some of the North Valley’s prominent leaders agree that it isn’t simply a time of growth. They argue there is more afoot, and a resounding concern is not about whether growth is itself an issue but what of our culture will stay intact and what we will save for the future.
Crested Butte has always been a bit in flux. Even the people of the Ute and Tabeguache Nation who once occupied this area resided here only seasonally and nomadically. As Indigenous people were gradually displaced by Spanish explorers and eastern European miners in the late 19th century, two very distinctive industries carved new ways of life in the valley — mining and extraction followed by recreation and tourism.
The mining era brought infrastructure and connectivity to the world. It brought resilience, strong community roots, and cultural heritage. The recreation and tourism era began as mining faded in the 1960s, and local storyteller, author, and psychotherapist Marci Telander refers to that second era as not only recreation-centric but one of “earth justice awareness,” a fitting description for the period that set the tone in balancing recreation and tourism with environmental stewardship and deep community. These would-be “mid-timers,” who moved here in the 1960s, ‘70s, and ‘80s, were environmental activists, professionals, entrepreneurs, and idealists — in Telander’s words, “casual folks doing serious work.” They established the ski resort, recreation trails, and nonprofit organizations — all built on a core value system of a uniquely engaged community that is still fundamental to the Crested Butte of today.
Another significant industry that sets the Gunnison Valley apart from other resort communities is the continual existence of ranching and agriculture in the valley. Respect and deference to our agricultural roots is a core community value, and ranchers have long taken part in environmental protection values through water rights, preservation of undeveloped lands, and a powerful connection to the land beneath our feet. Thousands of acres of private, primarily agricultural land are regularly put into conservation easements throughout Gunnison County each year, ensuring that iconic viewsheds and a landscape of ranching and cattle grazing remain intact.
Monumental changes
The trails, open views, and Crested Butte’s unusual combination of dynamic culture and relative isolation have caught on in the world. As Gunnison County Commission Chair Laura Puckett Daniels puts it, “We are now on the map.”
With that has come a decade of unprecedented growth, development, amenities, and wealth. New homes are being built at a steady pace, and at every corner of the valley, as evidenced by the “trade parade” of construction workers and equipment that flows between Gunnison and Crested Butte every weekday morning. That growth is also evident in the highest-ever number of building permits and land use change applications reported by the Gunnison County Community and Economic Development Department.
There are major new projects in various stages of the county’s development review process that could bring more than 1,000 new homes to the North Valley in the next few years: The Village at Mt. Crested Butte and the Whetstone Community Housing project just south of Crested Butte are both approved for a combined 600 housing units.
Two others, a new application for a 300-unit project at the Lower Verzuh property near Brush Creek Road and the 127-unit Starview subdivision south of Crested Butte South, are in the sketch plan review phase with Gunnison County.
Many other smaller projects, ranging from the high-end homes of the Aperture neighborhood in Crested Butte and the Oros luxury condos in Mt. Crested Butte to the Town of Crested Butte’s workforce housing projects, are approved and happening concurrently. Hotels in Mt. Crested Butte are planning major remodels and expansions.
The Crested Butte Community School is in the process of a $60 million facilities expansion. The Gunnison-Crested Butte airport received a $22 million terminal renovation in 2022 and now serves more airlines and flights with better reliability. The Crested Butte Adaptive Sports Center built a $16 million facility at the base of Crested Butte Mountain Resort in 2019, and a new $20 million Center for the Arts went up in Crested Butte the same year. There are now regular film, culinary, and literary festivals, and musicians and artists from all around the world are greeted by sold-out crowds. The latest major construction project symbolic of this wave of change is the 22,000-square-foot Crested Butte Fire Protection District station being erected on Gothic Avenue, which will be five times bigger than the existing one.
“IF THERE IS NOT A CORE COMMUNITY HERE, WE’RE NOT GOING TO BE A SPECIAL PLACE.”
Perspectives
The sort of development we are seeing in the mid-2020s isn’t new, but its scale and rapidity certainly are.
A comprehensive 20-plus-year study of real estate records of the Gunnison Valley shows a tumultuous series of real estate increases and price drops in the first decade and a half of the 21st century. From there, the numbers across the North Valley climbed steadily from 2016 onward, and in 2020 and 2021, we saw unprecedented increases in the price and number of home purchases. That wave is generally attributed to Covid, which attracted remote workers. And while many only came for a season or a year, many stayed. Five years later, the North Valley is undeniably affected by an increase in the second home-owner market and an increasingly wealthy demographic.
“We’ve broken down the barriers between tourists and residents, and there are people who come here to live despite working in a different state,” says Crested Butte Mayor and former Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory Executive Director Dr. Ian Billick. He calls this the ‘era of amenities.’
“We have great schools, great trails, great services; there are now lots of reasons for people to come here,” he says. “These are amenities, but they drive our property taxes up. And because those are amenities that people are looking for, they attract wealthier people. It might sound like it’s good, but it’s more nuanced than that.”
Billick observes that for better or worse, residents can vote for more amenities that they want, as they did with the new fire station, the school facilities expansion, and a North Valley Metropolitan Recreation (Met Rec) subdistrict.
“I think we have to be pretty careful. We have to plan to make sure we have a core community of people who can afford to be here, and we have to assess the value of our capital assets. What a rancher can sell a cow for, or what someone can earn at the resort or working on Elk Avenue, doesn’t cover the cost of a home,” says Billick.
In his term as mayor, Billick wants to focus on affordable housing, affordable commercial opportunities, and childcare, and he believes the Town of Crested Butte should hold onto its land assets where possible. “We need to focus on retaining properties that the Town owns because if we don’t have property, we can’t drive changes.”
He is also interested in the Town creating “basic, affordable commercial” spaces and being mindful that its regulations do not push out local businesses or force them to adopt costly standards.
Billick observes that those expenses tend to get passed onto consumers, perpetuating the cycle of a more expensive place to live. “We have to be careful about the regulatory burden we place on people,” says Billick.
Puckett Daniels has seen the valley through the lens of government, recreation, nonprofits, teaching, coaching, and, of course, as a citizen.
“We all feel a lot of ownership over our experience of Crested Butte, as if our experience of CB is the experience of CB. So, I balk about generalizing in a way. But one of the reasons I decided to run for commissioner is that it felt like there was this change afoot, and I wanted to be part of guiding it.”
Puckett Daniels believes the changes are a matter of Crested Butte increasingly being on people’s radar.
“Maybe we’re in the era of having been found,” she says. “When I first came to Crested Butte, it appealed to me because it was rural. Yes, we had sushi, and we had a concert series. And I liked the idea of having a town that had those things. But when I would fly back east, the people I met on the plane hadn’t heard of Crested Butte. And they lived in Denver… now, they tell me they were here biking just last weekend, and their friends have a second home here. Now, we’re on the map. Our desirability has increased, and our accessibility has increased. So, there is more competition for housing, and there is more wealth in organizations.” The result, she summarizes, is more of those nice things like live music and good food. “There’s more of everything because we have been found.”
At the county level, Puckett Daniels describes how some people have increasing expectations of government. “People have expectations about what condition their roads are going to be in, and what services are available. There is a tension between still wanting to have that rural quality but managing the fact that we now have a global market for our product.”
Telander has observed in her literature around the cherished local autumn Vinotok Festival that this community has many roles and characters. She describes the struggle between growth and maintaining the sense of uniqueness that has endured here, in no small part, because historically so few people lived here that most everyone knew each other and could pass stories and ideas on to those with shorter tenure.
Telander set out years ago to collect and tell the stories from “the old-timers,” mostly the people who came from mining families. She believes it is key for everyone, new and old, “to understand how people came to be here.” She speaks passionately She speaks passionately of the ancestral legacy the miners brought with them as political, religious, and climate refugees and the sometimes-horrific conditions they lived through. She describes “the old-time virtues of respecting the working class and ordinary people” and emphasizes, “We really needed to spend time with the old-timers to learn how to live here. That kind of modest living is very grounded here. We live in each other’s pockets, and our celebrations are like steam valves to release our hardships and come together. The old- and mid-timers set the tone for how our core community still prevails.”
What remains
Billick recognizes that preserving what is important is not simple or expedient. That concept is perfectly embodied in the almost-50-year fight to protect Mt. Emmons from mining, which was finalized in 2024. It took decades of hard work, advocacy, and a complex agreement between governmental and private entities, but it eventually worked.
Even as recreation put Crested Butte on the map for the hard-core who love the steeps and mountain biking trails, it is the wildflower-loving and townie-riding local residents who give this place its irreverence and also fuel the tourism and recreation industry as essential workforce members on all levels — from bussers to business owners to land managers. They have historically lived modestly, and Billick, Puckett Daniels, and Telander share a concern that they are somewhat endangered by the upscale changes happening around them.
“It has taken 30 to 40 years to figure out affordable housing,” Billick says. He reflects that many deed restrictions were lost along the way due to poorly written documents, economic downturns, and unforeseeable complications. “We are doing a much better job now. We are still figuring it out, but we all need to accept that we will make mistakes.”
The Town’s residential surveys indicate that about two-thirds of Crested Butte is occupied by full-time residents. This is significantly higher than most other resort towns, observes Billick. The Town’s Community Compass plan identifies goals like improving transportation, historic preservation, climate action, and a community plan regarding growth and development. A core theme is maintaining an attainable place for locals to live while maintaining transparency and authenticity.
“If there is not a core community here, we’re not going to be a special place. We have to stay focused on making it a place where lots of different kinds of people can live. We need to have housing stock that allows people to be the different versions of themselves at different stages in life,” says Billick.
How we integrate
Puckett Daniels summarizes, “I think we want to be a small community with all kinds of people at all kinds of income levels. I want to put in place policies and programs that let people who live here keep living here.”
She cautions that while some community members strongly feel that conserving all developable lands is the way to avoid too much growth, that, too, creates challenges. “Using only conservation as a tool would keep this place small,” she says. “But we will drive ourselves into being priced out if we make housing Resources scarcer.” At the county level, commissioners have taken on more than $120 million in debt service to build the Whetstone Community Housing project near Brush Creek. “Land use and development policies can help us retain that rural, small community feel while understanding that some of these forces are beyond our control,” says Puckett Daniels.
Telander says she is embarking on a “how to be a local” project, helping people who come here tune into parts of themselves that are harder to find elsewhere. She observes that many people in the world today are searching for home.
“I understand it,” she says, explaining the reasons people come to the valley: to tune into nature, community, and celebration. “Of course it’s attracting people; it’s what attracted all of us. People are hungry for what we do.”
Telander sees the arrival of newcomers as an opportunity to greet and share, much as she has been welcomed by her elders here and invited to share their knowledge. “We want to treat everyone as being sacred until they believe it themselves,” she says of her work in the community and with private clients. “People who expect to be treated as they would in large urban areas and privileged, gated communities may have a hard time. I am concerned about the lack of compassionate reciprocity in people who do not care about a retreating wilderness in their human-centric value system. People cannot come here living in bubbles and not participating,” says Telander.
“This is a period that is clunky and awkward, but the people here have always been joyous, non-status quo, embracing inconvenience, and collectively creating policies, nongovernmental organizations, and taking direct action. How do we ask people to live modestly? How do we ask people to give back more than they receive in this place?” she asks.
It’s hard to know how the relics of our past and current experiences will play out. Trying to characterize a current era of human existence in this enchanted corner of the earth seems doomed to underachieve. There are too many subtleties and unknowns.
“The very ink with which history is written is merely fluid prejudice,” wrote Mark Twain.
But as Telander describes, and history has shown, the prejudice of Crested Butte leans inward and outward in even steps — playing hard, looking out for each other, and fighting for shared values. “There are many people doing things in small ways that add up,” she says. “I think we are the people for this time.”