3 minute read
Community Characters
VILLAGE VOICE
Kim Montgomery is practically synonymous with Mountain Village
BY SAGE MARSHALL
It’s not a stretch to say that the lives of Kim Montgomery and Mountain Village are wonderfully intertwined.
When the Southern California native arrived to the area in 1987, she only intended, like so many others, to stay for a season and enjoy the life of a ski bum. As for Mountain Village, it wasn’t even a town back then.
Enchanted by the surrounding natural beauty and lack of lift lines, Montgomery stayed. She got a job with the ski resort and ended up Telluride Ski & Golf’s corporate secretary, working closely with Ron Allred and Jim Wells, then the resort’s primary owners. The pair were the driving forces behind the incorporation of the Town of Mountain Village in 1995, which means Montgomery was too.
At Wells’ encouragement, Montgomery took a job with the nascent town, her professional life progressing as Mountain Village grew from a clutch of buildings at the base of the ski resort into the vibrant, year-round community it is today. Montgomery started as the Town’s grant administrator, then became town clerk, then director of administration and, in 2011, town manager. She was, she says, motivated by her deep passion for the community and the people that make it special. “I’ve been here for 32 years and I still think ‘wow’ every day.”
And while she stepped down from the town manager role in October, Montgomery’s legacy in Mountain Village lives on. Notoriously modest, however, colleagues often referred to her as the woman behind the curtain, the one who kept everything running smoothly.
“I was responsible for implementing town council policy decisions,” Montgomery explains. “I directed the town operations to make sure they were efficient. One of the most important things to me was creating an organizational culture that valued the employees, but also resulted in the delivery of really great municipal services for our residents, visitors and businesses.”
Today, Montgomery cites the success of the Gondola as an accomplishment of which she is particularly proud of having been a part of during her long career. She took part in the project during its conception, as well as later, when she worked for the Town.
“When we started the Gondola projects, we all kind of bit our nails wondering if anybody was going to get out of their car and ride on this thing,” she recalls. “Fast forward to today and it’s transporting more than 3.4 million riders a year.”
Montgomery points to her skill at building relationships as a driver in her professional life, but also recognizes her husband, Russ, a local contractor, for his support.
“We’ve been married since 1995,” she says. “He’s just a rock … and his fingerprints are all over this place. I did a lot on paper, he does a lot that he can actually point to and say ‘look, I built that’.” Now that she has stepped down from her role in Mountain Village, Montgomery says she is excited to spend time with her husband enjoying all the San Juans have to offer. “Spending time in the gorgeous environment surrounding us in this magical place is one of my touchstones. Russ and I are also lucky enough to own some property to the south where we spend many weekends on the water, which hearkens back to my early years in Southern California. We basically have the best of all worlds.”
