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Aspen’s tiny houses are home to a small group of lucky seasonal employees. | Photos by Hal Williams Photography Inc

Philip Jeffreys as a full-time project manager working $600 per person,
specifically on affordable housing issues. Pressed for imme- per month. Hanle
diate-term solutions in a community where the permitting, said he doesn’t expect
groundbreaking, and building process can take years, the project will go far in
Jeffreys was forced to innovate, persuading ASC to make a solving the overall housing
foray into the nascent tiny house movement. The company shortage (ASC was still short
purchased the nearby Aspen-Basalt Campground several about 600 beds for employees
years ago, and this season partnered with Sprout Tiny this season), but that the homes
Homes, a Colorado-based builder, to construct six custom offer short-term flexibility and
500-square-foot trailer homes there. could point toward new avenues for expanding housing
“We’re really curious to see how the experiment works options in the future. “Like a lot of our friends across the
out,” said Hanle. “This model really has the potential for us industry, we’re at the point where we’re having to get cre-
to add housing immediately while we work on longer-term ative,” he added.
solutions to our employee housing crunch. The units look Washington’s Stevens Pass is one of them. “We’re
really cool, they’re super-efficient, and we don’t have to go definitely in that same boat,” said Chris Danforth, vice
through the same amount of process with them that we president of sales and marketing at Stevens Pass. As a ski
would for other housing.” area surrounded by public lands, Stevens Pass is severely
The tiny houses took eight weeks to manufacture, at constrained by strict development limitations, notwithstand-
a cost of about $100,000 each, and now rent for around ing the housing demand. In recent years the resort has been

“We’re really curious to see how the [tiny house] experiment

works out. This model really has the potential to add
housing immediately while we work on longer-term

solutions to our employee housing crunch.”

— J E F F H A N L E, A S P E N / S N O W M A S S

SPRING 2017 | NSAA JOURNAL | 35