“I am running because I think the economic vitality of Mountain Village is at a crucial crossroads,” says candidate Meehan Fee, a six-year resident of the Telluride region who moved, with her husband, Daniel Zemke, the corporate attorney for Telluride Ski and Golf Co., into Mountain Village’s Fairway Four in October.

“I feel it’s an area [in which] my expertise and connections will benefit the community,”

says Fee, who has worked for the Peaks Resort, and more recently for a management company bringing corporate groups “in and out of town,” for whom she organized events using “various vendors, the air organization, etcetera,” she says.

“I think my experience in resort tourism,” shepherding visiting groups ranging in size from 20 to 400 people, “and my experience with the Telluride Business Alliance really is a key aspect that the other candidates don’t have,” she says.

Working in the tourism and business center of the Telluride region, Fee says: “I have a true, true understanding of the economy.”

As to prioritizing the problems that face the Mountain Village Town Council, Fee says: “A few of the problems go hand in hand,” starting with the fact that “the state of the economy is obviously a major issue both for Mountain Village and for the country as a whole.

“I think that first and foremost,” she says, the economy “is where council needs to focus their attention.

“Without a strong economy,” she observes, “we’re not going to be able to focus on things like energy, affordable housing,” and an updated master plan.

“The vitality of the core is paramount to a successful Mountain Village economy, and it is not vital right now, when we have empty storefronts,” Fee says.”

Mountain Village, she says, “needs to capture tourist dollars in a myriad of different ways,” which “should not be based on any one factor,” she emphasizes, but “should be based on a varied economy in which the state of the housing and loan market of the town doesn’t matter,” but rather, that’s “just one piece of the pie.”

As for the concept of “sustainability” other candidates have called for, Fee says: “Sustainability I think is a bad buzzword” being applied to “a number of different issues.

“Sustainable business brings a sustainable community,” reflecting “as a whole a very symbiotic relationship with everything, especially in a small town,” In which “all our resources are interconnected and in interplay with one another.”

That said, she acknowledges: “To have a sustainable community, we need to make sure every bit of the community is healthy,” going on to “focus on parts that are a little weaker” to strengthen them and bring them along.

For example: “Clearly, we need to be much more careful about the carbon footprint we leave.”

Fee is critical of what she calls “divisive politics” throughout the community. “A name is a name, but so often the name is the most important aspect” of an issue, and “what people really latch on to,” and too often the name is misleading, she suggests.

For example: Affordable housing – which is, she says, “a misnomer.

“The easy answer is we need more of it. Affordable housing is one of our greatest issues, but I think it is tied into the economy, as well. If we have a more robust economy, with visitor numbers driving sales tax higher and higher, not for two seasons but maybe for three-and-a-half or four, we will have employees who will be able to afford affordable housing.”

As for Town Council’s sometimes-fraught relationship with the Telluride-Mountain Village Owners Association, she says: “I think there is work to be done. I don’t think any two organizations can have a sustainable relationship that benefits the community unless they are constantly working at it.”

But paramount, according to Fee, is economic vitality. “We lost a great number of businesses” this year in the Mountain Village Plaza’s core, including two furniture stores and two art galleries, as well as a sporting-goods store.

“We only have three or four businesses left,” she observes. Without economic vitality, “the Core won’t be able to retain the guests we do have. We must implement plans to keep the businesses we do have.”

Any final words? “Please elect me,” she says. “I look forward to working with the various individuals in the Mountain Village. “They’re one of the most interesting things in a town with a voting population of less than 1,000.

“I am a member of the working class; I am somebody that is here full-time, and I want to see the area improve.

“We want to hear people’s voices.”