Big Tupper Ski Area is seen from Raquette Pond in Tupper Lake in 2018. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)

TUPPER LAKE — The Franklin County Legislature voted Thursday to set Nov. 7 as the foreclosure auction date for the Big Tupper ski area and three nearby parcels.

The move comes after years of advocacy and legal jockeying by those seeking to restore the ski center and creditors who sought to prevent foreclosure on the grounds that it would unjustly deprive them of large sums of money they were owed from a failed development project.

The auction is scheduled to occur at 10 a.m. at the Franklin County Courthouse kitchen conference room, located at 355 West Main St., Malone, according to Franklin County Treasurer Fran Perry.

The Big Tupper ski area has long been defunct. Hailed as one of the largest development plans in the Adirondacks, private investors had sought to develop the Adirondack Club and Resort. While the Adirondack Park Agency granted building permits, the underfinanced project — caused in part by protracted court battles with environmental groups seeking to prevent development — never took off.

Owners stopped paying taxes on the property in 2013. Over a decade later, the county was finally able to foreclose on the property. In August, Franklin County Court Judge Craig Carriero ruled the public auction could proceed.

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Four parcels for auction

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The auction will cover four parcels, totaling $649,395.90 in minimum bids, according to figures Perry provided Monday. Each will be auctioned individually, although the order is yet to be determined by the auction company, she said. Perry said that there is nothing prohibiting separate individuals or groups from purchasing one or any combination of the parcels.

The largest parcel is the Big Tupper ski area, with a minimum bid of $468,873.71. The others include a marina located at 1715 state Route 30, a waterfront vacant lot on Big Tupper Lake, off of state Route 30 and Cranberry Pond, off of Little Simond road, according to the Franklin County real property database.

Perry said those are being auctioned for minimum bids of $148,987.30, $15,912.96 and $15,621.93 respectively. She said those figures were calculated based on “delinquent taxes, penalty interest and statutory fees” that are owed to Franklin County.

She said that she had spoken with her legal counsel, who told her that she was in the clear to proceed to auction. Absolute Auctions and Realty, the company handling the sale process for the county, advised her that Nov. 7 would be an acceptable auction date. Perry then proposed that date to the county legislators, who voted to approve it.

Absolute Auctions and Realty also advised Perry that bidders interested in the ski area need to put down a deposit of $100,000 to demonstrate that they have the resources to cover the price tag if their bid is successful. Perry said the money would go into a guaranteed deposit fund, but noted that Franklin County does not oversee that process.

“The county doesn’t handle any of that; it all goes through the auction company,” she said.

While the final bid will be significantly higher than the deposit, Perry said the auction company, who she said has handled similar processes “all around the state,” felt this was an appropriate figure to ensure potential bidders on the ski area are serious. She also said that Franklin County had regularly worked with the auction company for past foreclosure sales.

Perry confirmed that unsuccessful bidders will receive their full deposit back. She said the deposit would have to be made as part of the registration with the auction company, although she did not know when their registration deadline is.

At press time, Absolute Auctions and Realty had not posted an auction listing for Big Tupper on their website, aarauctions.com. Perry said the company was still gathering photos as part of their descriptions of the four parcels.

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Town shut out

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For a time, the town of Tupper Lake, which had worked with Franklin County on the matter, had planned to acquire the ski center. The town planned to renovate and re-open it as such. That changed with a 2023 ruling from the United States Supreme Court.

The case, Tyler v. Hennepin County, prohibited governments from foreclosing on properties and pocketing the surplus proceeds beyond what was owed in back taxes and related penalties. The court, in a unanimous decision, said this was a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s 5th Amendment. The relevant section of the amendment’s text reads: “… nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.”

This pertains to the town of Tupper Lake, which does not have the funds to cover what will likely be a final bid producing a surplus significantly higher than the back taxes and penalties. The town had planned to cover the taxes and penalties only, in exchange for the property, which they would have had first rights to do.

With the Supreme Court’s ruling, the town no longer had first rights to the mountain at the likely discounted price. In his August ruling, Franklin County Court Judge Carriero confirmed that the Big Tupper auction had to proceed in accordance with the Supreme Court’s Tyler decision.

While the news was disappointing to town officials, Tupper Lake town Supervisor Rickey Dattola said that the town is hopeful that whoever places the winning bid for Big Tupper will rehabilitate the ski center, as the town intended to.

He said he had been approached by two potential developers who expressed interest in re-opening the ski area and were curious about avenues of support available to them.

“Both of them are very much of the mindset that ‘We want to open this as a ski center.’ It may take a little time, but they were both very adamant about opening it as a ski center,” Dattola said.

He added that the potential buyers saw the mountain as a four-season resort, mentioning hiking and mountain biking options for the ski area’s off-seasons, a common theme among Adirondack ski resorts, as a means of generating additional revenue and remaining viable.

Dattola said that when the town was considering taking over the property, they estimated the cost of re-opening Big Tupper as a ski area to be around $15 million.

“That was from the Adirondack Club and Resort’s figures. … Those were from about five years ago, so there would likely be some increase to that,” he said.

Despite the large investment, Dattola had confidence that an investor with enough capital would be able to cover the costs, including potential further litigation by environmental groups.

“Some people talk about millions like you and I talk about thousands,” he said.

Dattola was clear in the mountain’s importance to Tupper Lake.

“The ski center is the town’s kingpin,” he said. “That’s the thing that’s going to say ‘I can open a business in Tupper Lake and I can survive for 12 months out of the year. That’s so so important.”

Given its importance, Dattola said he and many others in the area were glued to the outcome but were glad to see the saga appear to be nearing a conclusion.

“We got a month to wait. … We’re anxious, but it’s close,” Dattola said. We’re going to have a decision, and that’s the important thing.”