Page 10 - Flathead Beacon // 1.7.15

10 | JANUARY 7, 2015 NEWS
FLATHEADBEACON.COM
Downtown Whitefish.
BEACON FILE PHOTO
Facts
FIGURES
Numbers in the news
7,900
Estimated number of people who visited Whitefish Mountain Resort on Dec. 28, its biggest day ever.
22,600
Residents in Montana, as of last week, who signed up for health insurance plans through the federal online marketplace this year, including roughly 9,500 people who bought policies for the first time. Americans without health insurance have until Feb. 15 to buy a policy or face a possible federal tax penalty of up to 2 percent of their adjusted gross income.
$49.92
Price per barrel of oil after trading closed Jan. 5, the lowest level since the spring of 2009. Ample oil production, especially in the U.S., has sent prices plunging in recent months.
Power Outage, Cell Service Disruptions Impact Whitefish
Tourists crowded the winter resort town over the holiday week
By BEACON STAFF
Visitors crowded the resort town of Whitefish from Christmas through Jan. 3, and lodging properties report robust busi- ness despite disruptions to cell phone ser- vice, a power outage and heavy snowfall.
Although resort tax numbers are not yet in, both the Whitefish Convention and Visitors Bureau and the Whitefish Cham- ber of Commerce say occupancy rates were at or near 100 percent through much of the holidays, fueling the hospitality in- dustry in Whitefish’s downtown district while funneling record crowds to White- fish Mountain Resort’s Big Mountain.
It’s not clear what caused the cell phone disruption in Whitefish on New Year’s Eve, but the lull in service rippled through downtown as visitors struggled to communicate plans.
“It was wall-to-wall downtown inside and outside of businesses, and obviously with the dependence that people have on their electronic devices it probably put a cramp in some folks’ evening plans,” said Kevin Gartland, president of the White- fish Chamber of Commerce.
On Jan. 3, a power outage in Whitefish left area businesses in the dark, and while some chose to remain open through the blackout they were unable to accept credit and debit cards.
According to Flathead Electric Co- operative spokesperson Wendy Ostrom- Price a blown transformer at the White- fish substation caused the outage shortly after 7:30 p.m.. She said at the peak of the
outage more than 6,300 customers were left in the dark. Power was restored across Whitefish by the early morning hours of Jan. 4. She said it’s unclear what caused the transformer to break but that it was replaced the following day.
Gartland said the Whitefish tourist industry’s dependence on Mother Nature to deliver plenty of powder for skiers and snowboarders is sometimes a double- edged sword, and although some busi- nesses surely took a hit, the outage was re- solved after several hours.
“We depend on winter to make our business, and sometimes when it snows like this we lose a little business,” Gart- land said. “The power outage the other day is going to have an effect because it shuts things down. It makes it very difficult to do business, especially in the hospitality industry, and it put a damper on a lot of folks’ evening.”
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