o expended resources in recent years expanding into the areas of “Mountain Hosts” and OEC for non-alpine environments. This strategic diversion may help resorts of all kinds save money on other 4-season endeavors by extending its efficient highly skilled first responder workforce into those other business areas, lowering insurance premiums and compensation expenses. But it also detracts from the NSP’s core mission of skier and rider safety, and of providing competent aid tothose sustaining injuries in an alpine environment, at a time when Alpine Touring and other forms of off-piste recreation growth looks more like it did in 1938 at the NSP’s founding than even 10 years ago.
Ski-Patrol.net believes this dynamic will continue to devolve over the next ten years, unless it is addressed from a strategic perspective soon. Otherwise, it will almost certainly fuel an unfavorable structural shift in the US National Ski Patrol System, and the skier and rider safety model across the entire winter sports industry.
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