TELLURIDE — Chuck Horning was nowhere to be found.
It was 11 a.m. on April 1 and Telluride’s Town Council sat in its chambers in Rebekah Hall. The meeting agenda that day called for an hour-long update from Horning, the longtime owner of Telluride’s famed ski resort.
Telluride Ski & Golf is not just any other business in this remote southwestern Colorado town. The mountain represents the driving economic force of the entire region. Nearly every job, every resident in the area is affected by the decisions made by the ski company.
But Horning never showed up to give his update.
For the next hour, town officials and members of the public expressed deep-seated frustration with the erratic ski operator, lamenting a lack of accountability, follow-through and trust. A PowerPoint presentation prepared by town staff outlined 11 questions for the company centered on leadership, transparency, dialogue and commitment to the community.
They received no answers.
“I don’t feel like that trust is there,” said Dan Enright, a Telluride councilmember. “I don’t think I can trust Mr. Horning’s word, and his failure to show up today is the prime example of that. I want to work with the ski company. You are the hub of our economy, sir. So we need you to support our community.
“I feel like I personally have less trust, and our partnership is as weak as it’s ever been during my time in Telluride.”
The April meeting laid bare a growing schism in the opulent resort town, one that appears to be deepening. The relationship between the community and the ski company has long been tenuous here — but elected officials, business owners and residents say this partnership has deteriorated in recent years under Horning’s leadership. They point to his unpredictable nature, his my-way-or-the-highway leadership style and his refusal to empower executives to help him run the business.
Horning reneged on agreements that would have had his company help fund the replacement of the iconic gondola that runs from the town of Telluride to the ski resort. He ended a decades-long partnership for a free concert series at the last minute. He agreed to build desperately needed affordable housing, only to violate the deal, county officials say.
As corporate consolidation leads to fewer and fewer independent ski mountains in the United States, the fate of the 53-year-old Telluride ski resort — and the future of the entire region — lies at the whims of an 81-year-old real estate mogul with no known succession plan. Horning is now the acting CEO of the ski company after recently firing his own son from the job.
Horning’s behavior over the years, meanwhile, has become legendary in its own right. It appears that everyone in town has a Chuck Horning story: The time he was booed out of an upscale restaurant. The time he engaged in a fist fight with his son or traded blows with his chief executive. The time he carried a riding crop everywhere he went.
Many of these stories are open secrets in Telluride but have never been publicized until now.
The Denver Post spoke to four women who allege Horning sexually harassed or assaulted them during the last 17 years. Another woman alleged in a lawsuit that he forced himself upon her and had sex with her against her will. A former employee, in another court filing, accused Horning of violently shaking her after he grew upset over a landscaping issue. (Horning, in court filings, denied the allegations in both lawsuits.)
“There is no safe way to be a woman around Chuck,” said one of these women, who alleges Horning touched her inappropriately in 2023. She spoke to The Post on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retaliation.
Horning, through a company representative, declined several interview requests for this story and did not answer questions about the allegations of sexual impropriety or the lawsuits filed against him. The Post could not find any record that he was ever arrested for these allegations.
A ski resort spokesperson, in an email, said strained relationships between towns and ski companies are not unique to Telluride.
“For ski resorts, it is often perceived as ‘biting the hand that feeds you,’ and for towns, they often have a sense of entitlement for supporting the ski resort, and this can lead to friction,” said Nancy Clark, the company spokesperson. “It is unfortunate, but it happens throughout the country.”
Some locals say the beauty of Telluride Ski & Golf, known locally as Telski, is that it doesn’t operate like a large corporation. There’s no structured decision-making or cookie-cutter workflow. It’s just Horning operating in his own world.
“He’s sometimes like a cowboy,” said Sean DeLand, who has worked as a ski instructor and musician on the mountain. “He’s doing things his way.”
The Post compiled this report through interviews with nearly three dozen people, including current and former town officials, resort employees, business owners and residents. The newspaper also reviewed dozens of pages of court documents and hours of recordings of Town Council meetings.
The town appears to be reaching its breaking point. Anonymous community members this year created a website and Instagram account called “Chuck Chuck,” seeking to gather stories about Horning’s improprieties and force the owner out.
“It’s time for him to go,” said Jonathan Greenspan, a longtime resident and former councilmember of Mountain Village, which encompasses the ski resort.
How cracks widened with the ski company
Horning purchased the Telluride ski resort in late 2003 for $21 million from Japanese businessman Hideo “Joe” Morita.
The son of a doctor, Horning grew up in Southern California. With the help of his father, he developed a chain of nursing homes before making it rich in commercial real estate there.
Horning, soon after buying the ski resort, admitted he knew little about the industry.
“I am an ant on a log, floating down a creek and thinking I’m driving,” he told The Post in 2005.
He quickly hired Ray Jacobi, an industry veteran, to run the resort. But he canned Jacobi within a year because, in part, the chili in the lodges wasn’t any good, The Post reported at the time.
The resort owner has fired more than his fair share of chief executives over the years, much to the chagrin of town officials hoping for stability. That included Horning’s son, Chad, who had been a steady force atop the ski company before he was terminated in March.
“It was a challenging relationship,” Jacobi said by phone last month. Chad Horning did not respond to interview requests.
Telski is not just a normal business in Telluride and Mountain Village. The ski company is the region’s largest employer with hundreds of jobs, contributing millions to the local economy. It’s the straw that stirs the whole drink, from lodging and dining to event spaces and retail shops.
“These kinds of relationships are always tenuous when there’s one employer on whom the whole winter economy depends,” said Anne Brown, a San Miguel County commissioner.
Despite the ski company’s crucial role in the region, Horning has never ingratiated himself with the community, current and former town officials say.
“It’s very frustrating,” said Teddy Errico, Telluride’s mayor. “They don’t understand the big picture of being a ski resort owner. It’s more than just an independent company — there are so many ripples throughout the community. We have to have that mentality that we’re all in it together. That cooperative spirit is just not happening with the ski resort currently.”
Locals point to a series of recent events that hastened the relationship’s deterioration.
A year ago, Telski and the San Miguel Authority for Regional Transportation announced an agreement to replace the aging gondola that connects Telluride with the ski resort and the town of Mountain Village.
The ski company, under the deal, agreed to provide $1.5 million annually to the county, up from $250,000 under previous agreements. A ballot measure that fall sought to raise an estimated $8.2 million annually to fund gondola operations and maintenance.
While visitors can drive the seven miles from Telluride to Mountain Village, the gondola provides a 12-minute ride straight to the top of Lift 7, with stunning, panoramic views of the San Juan Mountains. It’s the first and only free public transportation of its kind in the United States, the town boasts on its website.
“The gondola and regional transit services are critical to the economic success of the region and the well-being of our community,” Chad Horning said in a statement at the time. “We recognize the incredible benefit the gondola system provides to the community, and we look forward to being a long-term partner with (the county) in the growth of our regional transportation system.”
But in March, just hours before the county was set to approve the signed contract, Chuck Horning abruptly pulled out of the deal. Forced to scramble, both Telluride and Mountain Village officials referred measures to November’s ballot, asking voters to approve taxes on lift tickets to fund the new gondola system.
“Tonight, I think it’s pretty clear that Chuck is neglecting both the resort and the community,” Mountain Village Town Manager Paul Wisor said at a March town council meeting. “Chuck is failing us all. I think this underscores the glaring need for both (Telski) and the community to have a competent and engaged CEO running the resort.”
Brown said in an interview that Horning’s about-face was the straw that broke the camel’s back.
“It solidified any suspicions that we don’t have a healthy partnership between the governments and the community and the ski resort,” she said. “It was reassuring to hear the ski resort had agreed to pay its share. When Chuck backed out, it was a real punch in the gut.”
Clark, the Telski spokesperson, said the resort “already contributes to the gondola in a meaningful way, and continues to contribute more than any other business or other entity. This is a community transportation amenity and everyone who benefits, not just the customers of one business, should participate.”
While Telski will contribute more than any other business to the operation and maintenance of the gondola by virtue of previous agreements and its real estate holdings in the area, elected officials say the company is currently not paying its share of the capital cost of the new gondola system.
In an Oct. 22 letter to the community, Horning disparaged the lift tax and Mountain Village’s elected leaders.
“A sane local government in an extraordinarily challenging and difficult remote resort area would seek to work with the ski company, the region’s economic engine,” Horning wrote. “Instead, for years now, the town has imposed a litany of illegal, unconstitutional and grossly inequitable burdens and obstacles on the ski company.”
Around the same time, Horning and Mountain Village locked horns over the Sunset Concert Series, a 25-year tradition that puts on free musical acts once a week during the summer.
Horning every year allowed the concert series to be held on Telski-owned land. This year, he said no.
The move prompted Mountain Village to condemn the parcel of land, an action later voided by a district court judge. The town ultimately relocated the concert to another location.
“Chuck Horning is not here, and that should concern all of us deeply,” Wisor said at a Mountain Village council meeting on March 13. “Tonight, we deliberated about something that affected his private land and he didn’t care. And to me, more importantly, we debated about something that affected his community, our community, and he didn’t care to show up.”
The two sides have since agreed to return the concert series to its original home at Sunset Plaza next to the gondola terminus in Mountain Village.
Town leaders and members of the public have also expressed disappointment with Horning’s lack of investment in affordable housing for his workforce. In a town where the median home listing price is $3.7 million, Telski workers increasingly cannot afford to live here.
The ski company in 2019 built nine homes designated as affordable units. The deal with the county stipulated Telski had to sell these homes to its employees or other qualified buyers.
After the two sides ratified the deal, however, company officials came back to the county and said they changed their minds, Brown said, seeking to retain ownership so they could rent the units themselves.
Last year, county officials began issuing notices of violation and fines to Telski. The company capitulated, selling six of the units.
But the goodwill between Horning and the community suffered again.
“It was becoming more clear Telski wasn’t always negotiating in good faith,” Brown said. “People came to understand that we couldn’t really trust them to have the community’s best interest in mind.”
Clark said the ski company is “frustrated by the reluctance of the town and county to permit more housing where it is needed.”
“They have repeatedly denied our plans to add more housing,” she said.
Town officials say Horning tends to ask for forgiveness rather than permission when it comes to building codes and other permits. Several elected leaders likened Horning’s dealmaking to Lucy Van Pelt and the football in the Charlie Brown comic strip: He’s constantly pulling the ball out of play at the last minute.
“He tried to circumvent all the regulations: environmental, historical and administrative,” said Greenspan, the former Mountain Village councilmember. “It’s very unique how he plays the game, kind of similar to what’s going on in Washington.”
Morale among Horning’s own workers, meanwhile, is slipping.
The resort’s 72-person ski patrol unit has been negotiating a new contract since this summer, but the sides remain nowhere near a deal, said Graham Hoffman, the union president. The company, he said, is offering wage increases for most workers that are far below the union’s demands. Trust remains very low between the two sides, Hoffman said, calling the negotiations “contentious.”
A potential strike is a “last resort,” he said, but if the union opens the season without a contract, “we’ll have to have hard conversations about the possibility.”
“We seem to be hurtling toward that now more than ever,” Hoffman said.
Clark said Telski cannot comment on specifics due to the active negotiations, but noted that the bargaining is no different than what other ski resorts around the country are encountering.
Domestic violence, sexual abuse and lawsuits
Aside from his unique dealmaking tactics, Horning’s personal exploits around Telluride have long been fodder for the town’s active rumor mill.
“Horning isn’t known for mincing words,” The Post reported in a 2005 profile. “His brash style has some townsfolk worried. He is often spotted late-night carousing through local bars, sometimes carrying a riding crop and chatting up local women. His late-night antics, which include licking the face of a female friend during a dinner with local officials, are uncommon for traditionally staid resort owners.”
A former Telski employee told The Post that they witnessed the ski operator bring prostitutes into the office. Horning did not respond to requests that he confirm or deny this. Greenspan said Horning used to drink hard alcohol during meetings. Then there were the publicly witnessed physical fights with his son, Chad, and at least one of his chief executives. Horning also did not respond to requests that he confirm or deny the fights.
Horning’s girlfriend, Parisa Golafshan, has twice been arrested by Mountain Village police on suspicion of domestic violence charges. In one 2018 incident, police found Horning with dried blood around his neck, a laceration on his head, a torn shirt and bruising around his left eye and temple, according to a police report. Horning told authorities that he and Golafshan had gotten into an argument and she struck him with an ornament.
Prosecutors dismissed the charges after Golafshan completed a diversion program, court records show. Golafshan did not respond to requests for comment, and Horning did not answer questions about the incidents.
Horning also has a long list of sexual abuse and harassment allegations, interviews and court records show.
One woman alleged in a 2011 lawsuit filed in Orange County, California, that she started dating Horning in 2009 and later worked for him as his personal assistant.
As part of the job, Horning required the woman to move herself, her daughter and her dog into his Southern California mansion, court records show.
On July 8, 2011, Horning arranged to have one of his employees take care of the woman’s daughter while he required the woman to come to his bedroom/office. Horning then “forced himself upon” the woman and “had sex with her against her will and over her objections,” she alleges in the complaint.
The woman, who The Post is not identifying because she says she is the victim of sexual assault, “felt violated, sexually manipulated and overpowered,” the lawsuit states.
In another incident, Horning began to kiss the woman and touch her in the back of a car, she alleged. She pushed him away and told him, “No.”
Horning did not respond to questions about this lawsuit, nor to any other allegations of sexual impropriety. In court filings, he denied all claims made by the woman.
It’s not clear whether the woman ever reported the assault to police. The lawsuit was later dismissed, but court records don’t show whether the parties reached a settlement agreement. The woman did not respond to questions from The Post regarding the lawsuit or its resolution.
The Post found several more women who alleged that Horning sexually harassed or assaulted them.
A Telluride woman told the newspaper that Horning, around 2006, pushed her up against a wall and grabbed her chest. The woman, whom The Post is also not identifying because she says she is a victim of sexual assault, said she quickly got out of the situation and never addressed the incident or reported it.
A Mountain Village resident said she knew Horning had inappropriately touched several different women. She said she witnessed one incident at a company party in which the ski owner patted a woman on her backside. The Post agreed not to name this woman because they still work closely with the ski resort.
And a third woman, who said Horning placed his hands on her inappropriately in 2023, called his actions “very invasive touching.” The owner was known to go in for a hug and place his hands on a woman’s backside — “or worse,” this woman said. Often, these incidents happened in public places so the women couldn’t react, she said.
“Just shock — absolute shock,” this woman said about her experience. “You just freeze and try and maintain your composure. You know he’s using that as a tool to get you off guard.”
Yet another woman told The Post that Horning once made comments about her cleavage, saying men like tight clothes (The Post agreed not to name this woman because she still works closely with the resort).
In 2015, a woman who worked for Horning alleged in a lawsuit that the owner, upset over a landscaping issue, grabbed her around the shoulder and began yelling at her and “shaking her as roughly and violently as he could.” The incident left the woman with red marks and bruising, along with “severe pain and suffering.”
In court filings, Horning denied the allegations, and the parties settled the case out of court.
Horning has faced other lawsuits over the years, both in Colorado and in California.
A California jury in 2000 found Horning and his son, Chad, conspired to defraud a business associate. The jury assessed $5 million in punitive damages against Horning’s company, Newport Federal Financial, and docked Horning $2.5 million and his son $500,000.
A 2017 lawsuit accused Horning of neglecting to pay thousands of dollars in overtime claims to one of his employees in California, in addition to harassment and retaliation allegations. The parties settled the case out of court.
A ski school worker alleged in a 2023 lawsuit that Telski owed them more than $110,000. The two sides reached a settlement the following year.
A housekeeper at a Telski-owned hotel in Telluride accused the company this year of violating Colorado labor laws by paying her and her associates from two separate entities. That lawsuit remains ongoing.
‘It doesn’t feel like he cares’
The overwhelming majority of people who spoke to The Post for this story said it’s time for Horning to sell the ski resort.
But they’re torn. Telluride has long prided itself on being an independently owned operation. A sale could jeopardize that status, turning their beloved mountain into just another ski slope run by a behemoth out-of-town corporation.
“We don’t want it to go to Vail,” said Catherine Davies, a Telluride business owner. “That’s our worst nightmare.”
Vail Resorts, headquartered in Broomfield, owns and operates 42 mountain resorts in the U.S., Canada, Europe and Australia and bills itself as the largest ski company in the world.
Telski’s Clark said Horning has no plans in the near future to sell the resort.
DeLand, the Telluride musician and ski instructor, said Horning has always been an advocate of his music. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the mountain shut down and live music was hit especially hard. DeLand was sitting on the beach on St. Thomas in the Caribbean when he got a call from someone at Telski. Horning, he learned, asked specifically for DeLand to come back and resume playing tunes at the resort.
“If Chuck likes you and he supports you and appreciates what you do as a worker, then he’ll help you along your career path,” DeLand said. “Other people who piss him off get fired.”
Horning is opinionated and speaks his mind, but that’s exactly what you want from a leader, said Cathy Schwindt, who worked for the ski company and has known Horning for 20 years.
She often thinks about one of his common refrains — “I plant trees and watch them grow.” To Schwindt, it means Horning is here for the long haul, not just to make a quick buck.
“I walk through town and see a prospering community,” she said. “The ski area is running, employees are working. I don’t see the negative.”
Plenty of locals disagree.
Residents say they yearn for someone who shows up, who cares about the community, who invests in the region and in the mountain. Instead, they’re often left speaking into the microphone with nobody there to listen.
“It’s sad,” said Laura West, store manager at the Overland Sheepskin Co. in downtown Telluride. “It doesn’t feel like he cares.”
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