New survey gives green light to traffic, pedestrian safety
By Barbara Rowley EBS CONTRIBUTOR
The results are in. The highest priority issues for the members of Big Sky’s largest and oldest homeowners’ association are traffic and pedestrian safety, according to a recent Big Sky Owners Association membership survey.
The survey identified four categories of current BSOA operations for members to prioritize: infrastructure, compliance and rules, environmental sustainability, and broader community involvement.
Members clearly chose infrastructure as their highest and most urgent priority, with pedestrian safety, traffic management, and pedestrian or bike paths identified as their most important projects, according to BSOA Chairperson Maggie Good.
“Next, members advised us to focus on architectural compliance and neighborhood rules, the foundational duties of most owners’ associations,” Good said. “Their answers indicated a strong desire for us to continue this work as we’ve been doing, although many also want us to be more proactive in fairly and quickly addressing compliance, especially those involving construction oversight issues, light pollution and architectural standards.”
Environmental concerns were equally important to members, with 75% of them ranking water quality and availability as a top issue, 63% advocating for fire-resistant landscaping, and 62% prioritizing wildlife corridors.
Finally, the organization’s historic and long-held place representing member interests in the broader Big Sky community remains important to its members—more than half of whom indicated they were satisfied with current levels of BSOA involvement and 27% requesting more. However, this area was ranked last as an urgent priority, with only 38% rating it as “very” or “extremely” important.
Morgan Brooke, chair of the BSOA’s strategic planning committee, said the survey results will be immediately used to create a more refined strategic plan for the 51-year old organization’s future, especially important at this point, as current Executive Director Suzan Scott is set to retire and a search for a new ED is underway, with a job description posted online.
“The BSOA mission directs us to ‘preserve, protect and enhance property values,’” Brooke said. “That’s pretty broad guidance; almost any action can fall under these categories.” Brooke speculated that this breadth might be why 77% of respondents to the survey said they did not understand what the BSOA does.
This deficit of understanding was especially obvious in the open comment sections of the survey, Brooke said. “We received hundreds of write-in comments from people worried about rapid and uncontained development, crowds, increasing high cost of living, limited restaurant choices, issues related to employee housing, and sweeping environmental initiatives they’d like to see implemented, all of which are way beyond our purview,” he said. These priorities largely exceed the BSOA’s Articles of Incorporation mandate, also highlighting a disconnect between member expectations and the BSOA’s legal authority.
Over 425 members answered the survey—a statistically significant response. “We will be directly responding to what our members have indicated they want from us,” Good said. “It is notable and helpful that member answers show so much consensus.”
The BSOA includes over 8,000 acres with more than 2,400 properties. This includes 13 subdivisions and 38 residential and commercial condominium associations within the Big Sky area of Madison and Gallatin Counties.
