By Fischer Genau DIGITAL MEDIA LEAD
Editor’s note: The Community Support Group is featured in “Stay for the Season,” an EBS documentary about seasonal workers in Big Sky.
With thousands of seasonal workers scheduled to arrive in Big Sky for the busy winter season over the next two months, the Community Support Group is once again preparing an assortment of events and resources to support this population.
The Community Support Group is an independent organization in Big Sky created to welcome seasonal workers to the area, coordinating potlucks, free winter activities like tubing at the Montage, and other gatherings. This year, it’s expanding its offerings. The group is adding a scavenger hunt with locals, two nights at Big Sky Resort’s Enchanted Forest and a sleigh ride at Lone Mountain Ranch to their slate of over 20 events. It’s also launching a new website to inform seasonal workers about these events and to direct them to potentially useful resources.
“I love the way the community is pulling together and coming up with lots of different ways we can help our seasonal workers experience Big Sky in Montana,” Laura Seyfang, the coordinator of the Community Support Group, told EBS.
Seyfang is most excited about the addition of the seasonal workforce scavenger hunt, which was an idea from Michelle Nierling, the dining and culinary administrator for the Yellowstone Club. Each team will pair three seasonal workers with two locals, and between Dec. 15 to Jan. 14 they will tour Big Sky and follow clues to about 20 different locations, from local businesses to natural attractions like Ousel Falls. Each group that completes the scavenger hunt will be awarded a prize.
Seyfang said the group designed the scavenger hunt with two main goals. The first is to help seasonal workers get to know Big Sky, as most of them only work here for four months and don’t have vehicles of their own.
“The second main goal is to connect those local workers with people who actually live here, and for us in Big Sky to get a chance to know people from across the globe,” Seyfang said.
Seyfang is also excited about the Community Support Group’s new website.
“This new designed website will do everything over the last few years that we learned we really need,” Seyfang said.
Formerly, information about the group was available on Visit Big Sky, and locals could volunteer with the CSG through Volunteer Big Sky, but Seyfang says that the new site will help seasonal workers find all the information they need in one place.
“I’m looking forward to meeting a new crop of people that are coming to experience the town and who are coming to help us,” Seyfang said.
This year’s seasonal workforce welcome party will kick off the season on Dec. 14 from 6-8 p.m. in the new Arts Council building in Big Sky Town Center. A full list of Community Support Group events can be found on their website.
