For ski resorts, hiring is uphill slog amid US student visa ban
DENVER — Milagros Sotelo was looking forward to traveling from South America to Tennessee to start a job at Ober Gatlinburg ski resort this winter. The 22-year-old student worked the last two ski seasons in the equipment rental shop at the small resort nestled in the Smoky Mountains and was excited to reconnect with friends, practice her English and take a break from law school in Lima, Peru, where she lives.
But on June 22, President Donald Trump signed an executive order temporarily barring a wide variety of foreign worker visas, including J-1 visas often issued to South American students who come to North America during their summer break. Sotelo’s plans were put on hold, and now she is scrambling to find a job closer to home.
As ski resorts try to figure out how to operate safely during the coronavirus pandemic, Trump’s order, set to expire at the end of the year, has added another obstacle heading into the winter: hiring enough temporary workers to fill crucial jobs like operating chair lifts, serving food and cleaning hotel rooms.
Trumpargued foreigners pose a risk to American workers as the country tries to jump-start its economy.
But Sotelo said there are plenty of jobs to go around, especially at and near ski resorts.
Many industry leaders agree, saying that even with Trump’s order in place, it’s difficult to fill seasonal jobs with domestic workers.
“A big part of the reason is — and this is true even during COVID — most Americans want a yearround job. They don’t want a revolving-door-type job,” said Dave Byrd, director of risk and regulatory affairs at the National Ski Areas Association.
Byrd said between 7,000 and 8,000 J-1 workers fill jobs at many of the country’s 470 ski areas every winter. Another 1,000 to 2,000 workers come to U.S. resorts on H-2B visas, which are also barred by Trump’s order. In total, foreign guest workers make up between 5% and 10% of the workforce at U.S. ski resorts, according to Byrd, who calls it “a critical amount.”
According to an NSAA report released in July, just over half of 202 U.S. ski resorts polled said they had trouble hiring a full workforce during the 2019-2020 winter season, and an average of 44 jobs went unfilled. The report said 27% of ski areas were understaffed in the summer, and an average of 21 jobs went unfilled.
Many seasonal jobs don’t offer benefits such as health insurance or retirement plans, Byrd said, and it’s even harder to recruit domestic workers because ski resorts are often in rural areas with expensive housing
Vail Resorts, which owns 33 ski areas in the U.S. and has historically relied on foreign workers, is recruiting more aggressively in local communities for the upcoming season and is seeing some interest among college students who have more flexibility because they are learning remotely or are taking a gap year because of the pandemic.
The NSAA and ski resorts across the country were keeping a close eye on two federal lawsuits challenging Trump’s order — one in Washington D.C. and the other in the Northern District of California. The D.C. judge kept in place Trump’s ban on J-1 and H-2B visas, so now the ski industry is pinning its hopes on the California judge throwing out the directive.