County Commissioners demand resignation of Ness, Strang, ask AG to investigate

GILFORD — The Belknap County Board of Commissioners released a statement calling on the immediate resignation of Gunstock Area Commissioners Peter Ness and David Strang. The board also wrote a letter to New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella asking him to investigate the conduct of Ness and Strang and to keep watch over the $7 million in Gunstock’s bank accounts. 

The County Commissioners are a three-member board that oversee county departments and funds. It is chaired by Peter Spanos, with Vice Chair Glen Waring and Clerk Hunter Taylor.

“The Board strongly believes the aforementioned Commissioners have conducted themselves in a way that has caused great harm to Gunstock and have clearly violated the public’s trust,” the statement calling for resignation reads. 

“The County Board of Commissioners feels very, very strongly that the reputation of Gunstock has been dragged through the mud because of the actions of Ness and Strang,” said Spanos in an interview.

The ongoing conflict, which led to the resignation of Gunstock’s management, “costs the county money every single day,” Spanos said. 

“We feel that there is a very real risk, if Strang and Ness will not resign, that Gunstock will not be ready for what is expected to be a very busy ski season,” Spanos continued. “Every day we lose on this is a day we risk Gunstock not being able to open.”

The letter to Attorney General Formella makes two requests: first, that the $7 million in Gunstock’s accounts be “scrupulously monitored” by the AG’s office, and second that the AG thoroughly examine the past and present conduct and actions of commissioners Ness and Strang with respect to their actions with Gunstock’s former management team and any indices of a conflict of interest.

The GAC supervises the funds and fund management of Gunstock. Following an above average year at the resort, the mountain has $7 million in its accounts. When he resigned last week, former commissioner Gary Kiedaisch told the remaining commissioners that he was concerned about what Chair Ness and Strang might do with those funds. Ness and Strang have not publicly expressed any intention to move the money since the resignation of the management team.

Ness declined to comment, and Strang could not be immediately reached for comment, on the calls for resignation and investigation.