SAM Magazine-Vail, Nov. 27, 2007-When Vail Resorts delayed Vail's opening by a few days earlier this month, the resort sent idle workers out on the town for a city-wide cleanup effort. A group of approximately 70 employees, ranging from mountain safety staff to ski patrollers, cat drivers and lift ops, roamed the Vail streets collecting rubbish.

The community-wide effort was organized by Alex Gentry, who works for VR in base area operations. "I thought it would be a cool thing to do," said Gentry, who added that "all the employees were paid for their efforts by their respective departments.

"We usually clean up the mountain at the end of the season," he noted. "But with the warm weather I thought it would be a good idea to tackle a new project. We all live here, this is our home, why not spend a day making it nicer?"

Gentry believes that the cleanup effort will become an annual event. "I'm already thinking about doing one this spring, when the snow melts," he says. \