Locals and tourists alike are hoping a deal can be worked out to enable skiing on Ruapehu, following the decision this week to liquidate Ruapehu Alpine Lifts.
The stalemate which follows a watershed meeting on the future of the Ruapehu skifields gives no certainty to a community keen to see the tourism asset up and running this winter.
Ruapehu Mayor Weston Kirton said three bids to take over and run the skifields failed at Tuesday’s meeting, held simultaneously at Auckland, Wellington and Ohakune.
The meeting was for creditors of Ruapehu Alpine Lifts (RAL), which went into voluntary administration with debts of $45 million.
“But we are no further ahead, and this is a terrible position to be in considering what is at stake,” Weston said.
However, he is hopeful a solution can be reached to enable skiing to begin as soon as possible.
The ski industry is a major employer in the region employing up to 1500 people and generating 13% of the Ruapehu District’s GDP during a good snow year.
The unsuccessful bids to run the skifields advanced at the creditors meeting, were:
- Resolution A: Public ownership to run both skifields put up by the Ruapehu Skifields Stakeholders Association (RSSA). This would have retained the business and assets of RAL in the current company structure, allowing creditors to either write off some of their debt or extend payment terms.
- Resolution B: A single bid to run Whakapapa put up by Whakapapa Holdings Limited (WHL), and another one to run Turoa, put up by Pure Tūroa Ltd (PTL). Each company would buy one side of the mountain for $1 and the Crown would take a 25 percent shareholding in both entities and loan them money. The bids by these two companies were favoured by the Government and recommended by the voluntary administrators Price Waterhouse Coopers (PwC).
When these resolutions were voted down, it left only Resolution C, which was to return RAL to the directors’ control and lead to them seeking liquidation.
Liquidation was underway as King Country News went to press.
However, each contender remained hopeful, with commentators tipping that the Government may act unilaterally to transfer the ski fields to the two private companies, WHL and PTL.
The Government has already offered handsome incentives to these two, including writing off debts owed by RAL and undertaking to cover costs of removing infrastructure from the mountain if skiing could not continue. These incentives were not offered to RSSA.
However, RSSA representative Sam Clarkson said because his group would effectively be taking over RAL and its existing concessions to operate, only RSSA could seamlessly continue skiing on the mountain for the forthcoming season.
The others would need to take legal steps to secure concessions, which would need to be approved by both iwi and the Department of Conservation, Sam said.
An emergency meeting of the Ruapehu District Council on Monday resulted in councillors being evenly divided, with half supporting the bids by private companies WHL and PTL and half supporting the RSSA’s public ownership model.
The council is still owed the $500,000 it loaned to RAL several years ago as part of the cost of building the Sky Waka.
In using his casting vote to support the bids from WHL and PTL, Weston said the private companies were more likely to be capable of repaying this loan to the council. They were also being supported by the Government, PwC and the Department of Conservation.
