PT Wood | Photograph by Adam Williams
Overview: PT Wood grew up in Boulder in the ’70s, skating and skitching around town. He came to the Arkansas Valley in the ’80s, like many drawn by the river and the skiing, and has been part of the scene in Salida, Colo., since.
He and Adam talk about the resilience needed to thrive in mountain town life. For PT, that’s included working as a river guide and a kayak sales rep, a housebuilder and pizza shop owner, as a whiskey distiller and entrepreneur (Wood’s High Mountain Distillery). Not to mention his public service locally for many years, including as mayor of Salida and now as a Chaffee County commissioner.
They talk about the rise of microdistilleries across the U.S. and how the events of 9/11 influenced that. And about why PT got involved in local politics and the most urgent issues facing Chaffee County today.
SHOW NOTES, LINKS, CREDITS & TRANSCRIPT
The We Are Chaffee: Looking Upstream podcast is a collaboration with Chaffee County Public Health and the Chaffee Housing Authority, and is supported by the Colorado Public Health & Environment: Office of Health Disparities.
Along with being distributed on podcast listening platforms (e.g. Spotify, Apple), Looking Upstream is broadcast weekly at 2 p.m. on Tuesdays, on KHEN 106.9 community radio FM in Salida, Colo.
PT Wood
Website: woodsdistillery.com
Instagram: instagram.com/woodsdistillery
We Are Chaffee’s Looking Upstream
Website: wearechaffeepod.com
Instagram: instagram.com/wearechaffeepod
CREDITS
Looking Upstream Host, Producer, Photographer & Website Manager: Adam Williams
Looking Upstream Engineer & Producer: Jon Pray
We Are Chaffee Community Advocacy Coordinator: Lisa Martin
Director of Chaffee County Public Health and Environment: Andrea Carlstrom
TRANSCRIPT
Note: Transcripts are produced using a transcription service. Although it is largely accurate, minor errors inevitably exist.
[intro music, guitar instrumental]
Adam Williams (00:15): Welcome to We Are Chaffee’s Looking Upstream, a conversational podcast of community, humanness and well-being rooted in Chaffee County, Colorado. I’m Adam Williams. Today I’m talking with PT Wood.
I cannot help myself but to kick things off with showing some love for PT’s iconic beard, you know, given I’m a beard man myself. To me, his lush white beard is emblematic of an adventurous outdoor life in the mountains. He tells us why he grew his distinctive handlebar mustache too, and I think his reasoning for that might well say as much about PT’s grit and personality as anything else.
He grew up in Boulder in the ’70s, skating and skiing around town. He came to the Arkansas Valley in the ’80s, like many drawn by the river and the skiing, and has been part of the scene here since. We talk about the need for being a chameleon to thrive in mountain town life, which PT certainly has done.
He’s been a river guide and a kayak sales rep, a house builder and a pizza shop owner, and of course now as a whiskey distiller and entrepreneur, not to mention his public service locally for many years, including as mayor of Salida and currently as Chaffee County Commissioner.
We talk about the rise of microdistilleries across the U.S. and how the events of 9/11 influenced that. We talk about the art of whiskey and the spirit of storytelling. We also get into why PT got involved in local politics, which I’m always curious to understand about anyone who runs for elected office. Given that so many of us, myself, most definitely included, do not choose to do so. I also ask him about the most pressing issues that we are facing here in Chaffee County right now, given his leadership role as a county commissioner.
The Looking Upstream podcast is supported by Chaffee County Public Health and the Chaffee Housing Authority. Show notes with photos, links, and a transcript of the conversation, as always are published at wearechaffeepod.com, and you can also subscribe to the newsletter there. You can see more photos and connect with the podcast @wearechaffeepod on Instagram.
All right. PT Wood, here we go.
[transition music, guitar instrumental]
Adam Williams: Well, not to start things in a weird way, PT, but I love your beard.
PT Wood: Thanks. You got a great one too.
Adam Williams: Well, thank you. I, I, I feel like somehow you have found some sort of secrets that, that-
PT Wood: (laughs)
Adam Williams: … to have it come out better. I don’t know if that’s genetics or if you’re doing something, I think the handlebar mustache really takes it to the next level, right?
PT Wood: (laughs) yeah, that was, uh, you know, I started doing the handlebar mustache back in the double aughts at the, when I owned Moonlight Pizza there. And then, uh, you know, kind of the hipsters took it on and I decided I was gonna outlive the hipsters-
Adam Williams: (laughs)
PT Wood: … with the, uh, handlebar mustache. So I held onto it. (laughs)
Adam Williams: Is that a spite move? (laughs)
PT Wood: A little bit maybe. (laughs)
Adam Williams: You told me the other day that, uh, it went white or gray when you got into politics locally here, and I don’t know how much you were joking and how much there was seriousness in that.
PT Wood: Yeah, pretty serious (laughs). It’s, uh, you know, I, I love, love, love local politics, but, uh, it can be kind of all consuming and, uh, it is stressful. We have, you know, as mayor, I had 6,000 people in town that I was responsible for, um, taking care of. And now with the county commissioner l- level, there’s 20,000 folks that my decisions can affect. And so, you know, you really wind up spending a lot of time thinking deeply about your decisions.
Adam Williams: (laughs) I’m just gonna call out what feels like an elephant in the room of the nation right now. And not all politicians think deeply and, uh, take that time. So I appreciate your investment. (laughs)
PT Wood: Yeah. (laughs) It’s, it’s unfortunate, isn’t it, because it is a, it’s, it’s a serious job and, um, the job requires serious people, and we don’t always get serious people running for, uh, public office.
Adam Williams: I think we’re gonna get into some of the, the politics in your work and your intentions here in a bit. I wanna maybe go back to some of the start at the start kind of thing. Um, you’ve been around Salida since the ’80s, and I feel like that’s a recurring decade in the stories of some of the people I talk with, with the river being the heart of that, right? People who’ve come in to be river guides and do different things, uh, in that industry. And so it makes me wonder, was there something in particular going on in the ’80s, or is it just a coincidence of who I’m talking to and what the age is and…
PT Wood: Yeah, I, I probably just partially that coincidence of the age and, um, but I think there was some significant things happening in the late ’80s. Um, Salida the, uh, extraction economies were going away. The railroad was starting to slow down. There wasn’t much happening here, um, besides the river really, but other ski towns around the state were starting to, to really boom and explode and were becoming harder places to live where Salida was becoming an easier place to live. Um, there weren’t really good paying jobs, but there were jobs and for a guy that didn’t need any money, it was a cheap place to live. Um, an interesting place to live, and kind of the crowd I was hanging out with from the river and from skiing was moving here. So my people were here.
Adam Williams: I don’t recall how long Monarch has been running as a ski area. How does that relate in terms of timing with the river and what was coming up then with rafting?
PT Wood: You know, so I think Monarch is, this will be their 77th year, I wanna say-
Adam Williams: Okay.
PT Wood: … or something like that, or a hundred and, I don’t know, it’s been there for, it’s one of the older ski areas-
Adam Williams: Okay.
PT Wood: … in the, in the [inaudible 00:06:18].
Adam Williams: So certainly longer than what we’re talking about.
PT Wood: Way longer. Yeah. But it was, it was certainly an influencing factor. Monarch, I, I’ve always loved Monarch because it is just this kind of small throwback sort of area. It’s not a resort, it’s a skiers’ hill. And all the other ski areas in Colorado for the most part, few exceptions, were becoming more and more corporate resort areas. I had been working at Purgatory for a long time, and they had got bought out, and when I was working there as a liftie, you, you know, you only made five bucks an hour, but you skied half the day. So it was like, “Whatever, I’m getting paid to go skiing. I love this.”
Adam Williams: And you were in your, what, twenties college age, something like that?
PT Wood: Yeah. Twenties, college age. Yeah. And then that kind of went away and they weren’t letting you ski as much anymore. And I’m like, “Well, I’m outta here. I’m gonna go do something else.”
Adam Williams: (laughs)
PT Wood: And, you know, and Salida was inexpensive and a great town and, you know, mountains and the best weather and the best river. And I was like, “I don’t know why everybody in the world isn’t moving to this town, but I’m [inaudible 00:07:29].”
Adam Williams: And now we have.
PT Wood: Yeah. (laughs) Most of them have now, right?
Adam Williams: Because you’re, you’re talking about it was cheaper to live.
PT Wood: Yep.
Adam Williams: And at this point, somebody who was in their twenties or is in their twenties now, like you would’ve been around that time, they’re saying, “What are you talking about?”
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: “Inexpensive. I can’t even imagine-“
PT Wood: Yep.
Adam Williams: “… that having been the case.” So I, I almost don’t even know what direction to ask a question in relation to that. I just feel like hanging out here for a minute with it, because you’ve seen some change then as-
PT Wood: Mm-hmm. Yep.
Adam Williams: … everybody who’s been here long enough has. To think that this was a, a, an inexpensive place-
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: … is kind of unfathomable to a lot of people, I suspect.
PT Wood: Yeah. It’s kind of mind-boggling, right? But it was, it was also, while it was an inexpensive place to live, the jobs were five bucks an hour. So, you know, you weren’t getting rich being here, but you could afford to be here. And it’s, you know, it’s unfortunate that we’ve lost some of that, but I think the trade-off there is that now we have a vibrant alive downtown. Back late ’80s, probably 40% of the businesses were, were shut down, boarded up. Um, there wasn’t much happening in downtown Salida. You could go to First Street Cafe for food or over to Mama D’s for a, a Chicago dog or something (laughs). There wasn’t much happening, you know? Um, and now we have this lively, vibrant town and valley, um, but it is more expensive.
Adam Williams: I think that probably feels bittersweet to the people who’ve been here long enough-
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: … to feel the change-
PT Wood: Yep.
Adam Williams: … and the change in terms of traffic, maybe of people-
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: … uh, tourism, people moving in and out as residents, the expensive things. But there’s a lot of great stuff here-
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: … in addition to what might have been, you know, the good old days of before all that.
PT Wood: Yeah. It’s, I don’t know, the good with the bad, right? I mean, there you can’t have all good, and hopefully you don’t have all bad, um, you know, there’s, there’s a mixture there and you kind of roll with it and make the best. And, you know, I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else. This is the greatest place on earth. And, you know, even I go out and travel and go somewhere great, I’m excited to come back to Salida.
Adam Williams: Absolutely.
PT Wood: And, and I hear that from a lot of people.
Adam Williams: I love this kind of environment so much that when I think of vacations, I’m thinking, where else in the mountains can I go?
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: Like, which is kind of strange. I grew up in the Midwest. I never thought, “Can I go to a vacation somewhere in a place just like where I’m living?” You know? But here I have no problem going to another mountain location-
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: … because I just love being around that. And it’s like, “Okay. It’s a little bit of a change of scenery and I’m still excited to go back home.”
PT Wood: Yep. For sure. That’s great.
Adam Williams: I wanna find out if we go further back in time, kind of about your growing up.
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: You grew up in Boulder.
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: I’m thinking ’70s into the ’80s would’ve gotten the bulk of your childhood and into your teen years.
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: There’s probably been a lot of change around there too. (laughs) And I wonder what it was like back then.
PT Wood: Yeah. So I was, you know, I was born in ’65, right, and so then I graduated from high school in 1983. Um, and Boulder was a pretty blue collar working town, kind of more of a, a Denver suburb, I’d say. Right. Um, my dad worked for the National Bureau of Standards and all my, uh, all my friends, uh, uh, folks were, um, either working at the university or working at Incar, um, or, you know, some generally sciencey government type of jobs.
But it was, it was fun. It was small. We’d, uh, we’d skate downtown from south Boulder to, you know, across town and no problem I [inaudible 00:11:29]. One time, we, we… skitching was a big thing when I was a kid, where you’d go out and grab on the bumper of a car when the roads are all icy and get drug around and, uh-
Adam Williams: Just on the soles of your shoes?
PT Wood: Yeah. Just on the soles of your shoes. And I remember we did that one time and wound up far, far, far north Boulder, um, out near Valmont Road there. And we were just having a blast, you know, just kids. And all of a sudden we’re at Valmont Road 15 miles from home (laughs). “Oh, Oh boy. Oh, now we’ve done it.” Um, but, you know, you, that stuff that you, there was no way you could get away with doing that in, in Boulder anymore. No way.
Adam Williams: Did the people pulling, you know, you were back there. Like, was it so common?
PT Wood: I had no, I had no idea.
Adam Williams: No, no. No. Okay.
PT Wood: No idea (laughs).
Adam Williams: How old are we saying you were?
PT Wood: Oh, I don’t know. We were probably 15 or, you know, something like that.
Adam Williams: When you say skating, talking about skateboards?
PT Wood: No, skitching is what we called it.
Adam Williams: But before that I thought you used the word skating.
PT Wood: Oh, skating. Yeah, yeah. Skateboards. Yeah. Yeah. We had-
Adam Williams: So that would’ve been kind of at the beginning of skateboards.
PT Wood: Uh, you know, in the, that would’ve been in the, yeah, ’70s or so. We had a great, uh, skate park that got built in Boulder in the late ’70s out on Baseline Road. And it was, I mean, it was huge. Uh, I don’t know, an acre or more. I just remember it being really huge. And we would, uh, you know, we, we all built our own decks and then you’d go and get the tires and the trucks from the skate shop or whatever and build it. And then we spent hours out there just kind of rolling around. And it was cool.
Adam Williams: That’s a little earlier than I might have guessed to have a skate park, to have a skate shop.
PT Wood: Yeah. Yeah.
Adam Williams: I mean, I guess it is in the ’70s when, when the popularity of that started coming up.
PT Wood: Yep.
Adam Williams: But I still would associate that more with California.
PT Wood: Yeah, right. Yeah.
Adam Williams: Right, surfers who are trying to catch waves on land and, and keep riding when the waves were good.
PT Wood: Yep.
Adam Williams: So it’s interesting, it had made it this far inland and that that was part of your childhood too.
PT Wood: Yeah, it was cool. And it, you know, it was unfortunate that skate park only lasted a, a handful of years before they tore it up and put in a strip mall, which was, you know, tragic to every kid in Boulder, but happened.
Adam Williams: Life is change.
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: Like, we’ve already hit on a bunch of change here and, and it’s, it’s fun to look back at these stories that are, I’ll say nostalgic, I’m sure it is for you. For me, I don’t know if I get to use that word because I wasn’t around to have the experience, but it’s something, it’s something cool. I love hearing the stories.
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: And can kind of feel a little wistful that those are times gone by. But I suppose that’s what life always is, right? We’re always moving forward and so you kind of look back to what you think you don’t have anymore-
PT Wood: Yeah, for sure.
Adam Williams: … while, while also getting to have the, the cool, awesome new things that we have now.
PT Wood: Yeah. Right. I mean, there’s always something interesting happening. And I like change. I like, I, I, I like that progression of life and that progression of just interests and things.
Adam Williams: You’ve described the need to be a chameleon in mountain town life.
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: And I think your history here in Salida kind of shows some of that because you’d mentioned owning Moonlight Pizza.
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: You obviously have founded and, and own Woods Distillery now, um, county commissioner, you’ve been mayor, I think you’ve built houses, you’ve done a number of things. I’m curious about that chameleon to make life work in a mountain town kind of thing and, and the necessity for that. And just your thoughts on what that takes and, and maybe even why. Why is that so much harder in a mountain town versus somewhere out in the plains of the middle of the country?
PT Wood: Yeah. Yeah. I haven’t lived in the plains out in the middle of the country, so I don’t know if I can really speak to that. But in the mountains, it, um, you know, it’s expensive to live here, typically, um, the job opportunities can be somewhat limited, so you do have to kind of be able to turn on a dime and, and do a lot of different things. And, um, again, I, I have a lot of, uh, I, I like change too, so maybe that plays into it somewhat.
But, you know, going out and doing a lot of different things is, uh, I think sometimes necessary to stay in a mountain town, um, to be successful in a mountain town. It helps to have a lot of varying skills that you can lean on depending on how the economy is going and what’s happening. And, um, it’s kind of fun too.
Adam Williams: How did you cultivate these skills? I mean, and, and I guess this, the willingness to leap into business ownership, but when we talk about building houses, I don’t have those skills. Nobody out there should hire me to build their house.
PT Wood: (laughs). I was lucky to have a lot of, uh, good mentors along the way. I got… Uh, when I first started to build houses, I had, uh, we were putting in a concrete patio at, uh, a house over on at, that I owned on Park Avenue. And my buddy Mike Reed came over and he, uh, he was mainly doing it, but he needed some help. So I helped him out. And, um, not long after we had done that, I had been, I had been working for Wave Sport Kayaks at the time, selling kayaks. And that job went away.
There was like this, uh, consolidation of, of kayak companies, and they all got together and got rid of their independent, uh, sales reps across the country within a week, uh, during, uh, I think that was 2001 or ’02. And so all of a sudden, all the kayak reps in the country are like, “Ah, what’s the next step?” And I was talking to Mike and I’m like, “Man, I don’t know what I’m gonna do.” He’s like, “Well, come build houses with me. I got plenty of work.” So went to start helping him do that. And, uh, it just kinda worked out.
Adam Williams: Let’s talk whiskey.
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: Because that’s a venture as well, and adventure, um, and a lot of learning and developing those skills, like we’re saying, to keep adapting and-
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: … I imagine going to a passion area for you too. I, I would assume-
PT Wood: Oh, yeah.
Adam Williams: … you have to really-
PT Wood: Yes.
Adam Williams: … like this thing. So how did you come to whiskey and distilling and opening up a distillery?
PT Wood: Yeah. That, that, that started on a Grand Canyon trip back in, uh, 1995. Um, I think that was, uh, Julie Jackson’s permit who owns, uh, J Squared down here.
Adam Williams: Okay.
PT Wood: I don’t know if you’ve talked to her, but she’s super interesting person. She’s great. And, uh, a bunch of, you know, just a bunch of folks from around town on that trip, uh, including Peter Simonson, who owned the Victoria Tavern.
Adam Williams: Okay.
PT Wood: Um, and he brought a bunch of different whiskeys, and we drank a bunch of whiskeys on that trip, and kind of by the end, I was like, “Man, I want to make whiskey.” And I don’t know where that idea ever got into my head that you could actually do that. Um, but I was like, yeah, I’m just gonna make whiskey. And I, uh, pretty much every river trip after that, when someone broke out a bottle of whiskey, I’d be like, “Ah, I’m gonna make whiskey someday.” And finally after, geez, what, almost probably 15 or 20 years of telling that story we opened in 2012. So you can do the math there.
Adam Williams: Okay. Yeah. Yeah.
PT Wood: Um, I got around to doing it and it was just, it was just in my head, something I wanted to do. And, um, I’ve never been, never been afraid to start businesses or to take chances or whatever. Just, I mean, the… So the happiest I’ve ever been was when I was completely broke poor river guide guy. So, you know, going broke has never been a concern or a fear of mine.
Adam Williams: I was gonna ask where that comes from, and is it rooted in something even earlier? Like were your parents or family or friends or whoever you grew up around and were kind of socialized by, were they risk-takers, were they people who showed you, um, how to not be so fearful of those possibilities?
PT Wood: (laughs) yeah. Um, well, that’s a good question. Um, yeah. So I think there’s a few things. My dad, uh, was an entrepreneur. He started a number of different companies. He’s still starting companies. He’s 85 years old now, (laughs) still starting companies. And then growing up ski racing. And I think a great story.
My buddy Mike Parsons’ parents used to take us up to the top of Caribou Road and they’d go cut some Pete for their garden. And at the end of the day, we’d jump on our BMX bikes and ride down Caribou Road. And, you know, these were bikes that we had made. They, you know, you couldn’t go-
Adam Williams: (laughs)
PT Wood: … buy a BMX bike back then. You had your Schwinn Stingray frame, and you put the, the kind of nobby tires on it and change the handlebars. And so the bikes were pretty sketchy, but they’d let us off at the top and we’d ride down and they’d follow behind us and, uh, you know, check our speed, and they’d be yelling out the window, you know, like, “30 miles an hour, 35, 40.” You know, we’re on these sketchy bikes. And-
Adam Williams: Was that to slow you down or to say-
PT Wood: No, to encourage us. I don’t-
Adam Williams: … “You’re getting that, yeah?”
PT Wood: Yeah. I was pretty sure they, they were trying to get rid of us. Us I think we might have been a thorn in their side (laughs). But that was, that was just always kind of part of, of being a kid, right, was going out and doing dumb stuff.
Adam Williams: Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think all the time with my, my boys who are, you know, at least one’s a teenager already, it’s like, “Man, kids are dumb.” And so was I. Right?
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: Like, we, we just survive it.
PT Wood: Yep. That’s how you, you know… You learn a lot from doing dumb stuff.
Adam Williams: Yeah. Yeah. I, I, I’ve, I’ve sat around with my older brothers and, and kind of talked about, “I can’t believe we survived that one.”
PT Wood: Yeah. Right.
Adam Williams: But, uh, yeah, you learn a lot and, uh, develop some grit. Right?
PT Wood: Yep. For sure.
Adam Williams: So if we keep talking about whiskey a little bit, I’m curious where your interest in these things fits into what feels like, I don’t know if it’s a resurgence or if it was a totally new business idea that microbreweries and these local distilleries, it seems like in the past 20 or so years is when these things have really come up. And now to go into rural areas like this, like Salida, like BV, and you have both.
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: And it, it just feels like such a cool thing and an entrepreneurial spirit.
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: And I mean, it tastes good.
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: (laughs) Right?
PT Wood: Right.
Adam Williams: So what’s, what is some of that history a- and as your understanding of it and then how you kind of fit in with Woods Distillery as part-
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: … of this boom? Like, what do you think led to this?
PT Wood: Yeah, sure. So, the industry really kind of started and the, uh, for the micro-distillery in the mid, uh, double aughts, so 2003, ’04 is when you see the first ones really start to show up. And what happened was before 9/11, 2001, the ATF was doling out the licenses for distilleries, and they didn’t want to talk to anybody. They were like, “There’s eight big distilleries in the country. We’re good. We don’t need anymore. We’re not gonna give out any licenses.” After 9/11, uh, the ATF got, um, was told to focus on firearms and explosives and that kind of thing. And so they carved off the alcohol piece into a, a taxing bureau called the Alcohol and Tobacco Taxes and Trade Bureau.
So it went from an enforcement bureau to a taxing bureau, and they were like, “Oh, we don’t have enough, we don’t have enough businesses to collect taxes off of. We need more.” So they became very pro business and very supportive of the startup businesses. And you could call ’em up and they’d walk you through the licensing process, and they became just super helpful. And that is what led to the explosion of small distilleries. I think there’s maybe 2,500 across the country now, whereas in 2005, there were maybe 15, something like that. Um, and when we got… I’ve been thinking about this a lot, and we had tried in, uh, the early double aughts, 2001, 2002 to get something going.
But again, the ATF, they wouldn’t return my call. So I finally gave up and went into the pizza business. That’s when we bought Moonlight Pizza. But in, uh, 2000 and, uh, I think it was, well, 2005 or so, we were going down to Silverton a lot, and we would always go into the Montanya Distillery, which was in Silverton at the time that had just opened up. And I was like, “Oh, these guys are doing it. That’s cool.” And then, um, in 2007, we were on a DESO trip, and a friend of mine, Kurt brought, uh, one of the first bottles of Stranahan’s. And I was like, “Oh, this definitely can happen.”
So that’s when I really dove into it and we started to working with my brother to develop a business plan and get things going. And, uh, um, again, it took from then till about 2012 to actually get up and running. But, uh, it was, we were, we were all in by then.
Adam Williams: You had those years of really wanting to make whiskey.
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: You know, I’m thinking you could have been, if you remember, and, and think about the TV show Mash, you could have been like Hawkeye Pierce with a still in the corner.
PT Wood: (laughs)
Adam Williams: And you could have just done it for yourself.
PT Wood: Right.
Adam Williams: This commitment and, and whiskey is, you could really gotta dive in and allow some time for this to even develop before you can even open the door and say, “Hey, I have a bottle.”
PT Wood: Yep.
Adam Williams: That’s, you know, a kind of a big vision and, and commitment to the energy needed to go from this, “I can do it just for myself,” to let me make a business out of this and a livelihood out of this. How, how do you connect and leap that gap? ‘Cause again, why not just do it for yourself and call it good?
PT Wood: Uh, well, that would be totally illegal, and I would not do anything illegal.
Adam Williams: (laughs)
PT Wood: So (laughs), you know, I don’t know. It never really occurred to me to make, that I was gonna make whiskey in my kitchen. That never, that was never even a thought. I was gonna make commer- a business out of it, and I was gonna, you know, have a room full of barrels. And, um, that was, I think that was… Uh, starting a business was as much of the allure as the making of the whiskey part.
Adam Williams: Okay.
PT Wood: I really wanted to make the whiskey, but I really wanted to make a business as well.
Adam Williams: Is that from a creative standpoint too, to, to say, “I want people to be able to enjoy this product that I make that meets the expectations?” Like there’s a, there’s a feedback loop there that-
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: … says, “I wanna make whiskey that is quality enough that people appreciate it-“
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: “… and then they’re willing to pay this thing for it.” And I, you know, you can kind of keep spiraling it up into something-
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: … of value beyond your kitchen, I guess.
PT Wood: Yeah. Yeah.
Adam Williams: But it’s interesting that that’s illegal to do, but as long as you go make money and pay taxes on it, and you serve this to other people right in front of our eyes.
PT Wood: Right.
Adam Williams: Then you’re good.
PT Wood: Yeah. As long as there’s license. Right. And there, there is a movement around, uh, across the country to, uh, legalize home distilling. And there’s a few states that have done that, and it’s an interesting kind of push-pull between state rights and the TTB trying to regulate this. But that’s another, whole nother hour or two to talk about. But, um, the art part that you, you kind of, uh, leaned into a little bit. There has been, uh, one of the more challenging things.
I take it… You know, I, I watch people drink our spirits all the time, and if someone’s face kind of crinkles up, I take that very personally, like, “Oh, geez, what I do?” You know? And I, um, it, I take it, it’s tough for me to see people not really love what I’ve made. Right. And, um, I know that happens on occasion, but it’s, I want people to really love it and to be like, “Wow, this is great. And this is really, you know, I’m glad I came in here.”
Adam Williams: You gave an interview to Outside Magazine several years ago, and they referred to you as the “whiskey-sipping, kayaking mayor of Salida,” which of course-
PT Wood: (laughs)
Adam Williams: … at the time you were mayor, you’re now-
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: … county commissioner. But that description seems to still kind of encompass a lot about who you are and, you know, this wide-reaching, broadly interested and skilled person. Has that always been who you are? I guess, you know-
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: … this multifaceted person who, you throw the beard in with the whiskey–
PT Wood: (laughs)
Adam Williams: … you throw the skiing and the kayaking in, we’ve got a mountain man going on here.
PT Wood: (laughs)
Adam Williams: Somebody of real compelling interest, I feel like.
PT Wood: Yeah. Yeah. I don’t know if I, I don’t know if I’ve ever thought a whole lot about that. I, you know, I love being in the mountains. I love skiing. I love kayaking. I love rafting. I love r- riding my mountain bike. I was, uh… Just Sunday I went up and I did the crest and decided to come down Greens Creek ’cause I hadn’t done that in a while. And I was like, “Maybe it’s not as, as, as rocky and rough as I recall.” It is as rocky, as rocky and rough–
Adam Williams: (laughs)
PT Wood: … as I recall. But there was, uh, a bunch of kids on, uh… Um, kids, I don’t know, they were probably in their twenties, you know, maybe thirties, I don’t know. Now anybody under 50 is a kid to-
Adam Williams: [inaudible 00:28:59]
PT Wood: … me anymore. Right. But they had their full suspension bikes and all their fancy gear, and they caught up to me and I was like, “Oh, heck no, these guys aren’t dropping me.” So I chased them and stuck with them the rest of the way down the hill. And I was just like, yeah, I’m oh, a little, uh, competitive that way. Let’s go with competitive. Like, I don’t like (laughs). I don’t like to be, uh, to be shown up or beaten too much. So I, you know, I think that drives some of that, uh, uh, commitment to get out there and actually learn how to kayak and to bike and all that, you know?
And it took me, the kayaking thing did not come easy. It took me eight years to learn how to roll my kayak. Um, it was a struggle, a struggle. But once it kind of, once it came to me, it was just like, “Oh, this is, this is it. This is something that I’m actually good at.” And that was, and that happened kind of almost overnight. It was pretty cool, you know, after eight years of practice and then all of a sudden wake up one day and I was… It really happened in Gore Canyon. I was paddling that I didn’t know how to roll my kayak the first time I paddled Gore Canyon, which is on the Colorado River, kind of this pretty stout class five section of Whitewater.
And the last wrap, it is called Kirschbaum, and it’s the longest shallowest Rapid down there. And I flipped over at the top. Um, again, I didn’t know how to roll my kayak at the time. I’d been trying for years, but didn’t have it. Hit my head on the bottom, rolled right up and paddled through the Rapid. Never had another problem with my roll. It was, it was an epiphany, I guess. It was cool.
Adam Williams: Hitting your head on the bottom.
PT Wood: I suppose, I don’t know.
Adam Williams: Jarred it loose and made it connect.
PT Wood: Jarred it loose. Yeah.
Adam Williams: That feels like to me, as somebody who does not kayak and as, actually, that’s one of the things if I were to imagine myself trying that I would fear the most is not-
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: … being able to roll back up. How do you go through years of that? It would seem like you would encounter a lot of scary, potentially life-threatening situations–
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: … before you got that figured out.
PT Wood: Yeah, definitely.
Adam Williams: How do you get outta those situations?
PT Wood: (laughs)
Adam Williams: Luck over and over?
PT Wood: I think it has a lot to do with being stubborn. Yeah. Very stubborn.
Adam Williams: Wow. That, that just, I, I almost feel a, a panic coming over me, just imagining being in that situation and not knowing for sure how to get out of it.
PT Wood: That’s how I felt pretty much every time I went kayaking for a long, long time. And then, you know, once I rolled up and I knew that I could roll up every single time, it was just like kid in a candy store. I was out running everything I was doing, you know, I was in my kayak all the time, upside down all the time, whatever. It was just, I was having a blast.
Adam Williams: People know you as PT, and I hope you don’t mind my pulling out this part from that Outside article-
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: … but you shared your full name in that as Powell Thomas Wood.
PT Wood: Yep.
Adam Williams: You know, it sounds (laughs), that name sounds like kind of a blue blood east coast–
PT Wood: (laughs)
Adam Williams: You know, if you throw a, the third or the fourth on the end of it, it sounds like you’re going to inherit the railroad fortune or something.
PT Wood: (laughs)
Adam Williams: And that kind of goes against this picture of who we’re describing right here.
PT Wood: Right.
Adam Williams: You know, the, the, the mountain man-
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: … kind of thing. And the whiskey-sipping, kayaking, local politician.
PT Wood: (laughs) Yeah.
Adam Williams: Yeah, I don’t know that there’s a question with that, but just kind of, it, it struck me as amusing a little bit, maybe.
PT Wood: Those were both my both my grandpa’s first names, and so I inherited those.
Adam Williams: You, you’ve joked also in that article that PT stood for passing through and that your parents were hippies. You were born in the back of the bus, but then you go ahead and copter this, “Well, I was really, was born in a hospital in Boulder.”
PT Wood: Yeah (laughs)
Adam Williams: Which makes me wonder, are you… First of all, were your parents hippies at all? You’ve described that something about your dad–
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: … and that might or might not go with being a hippie, or are you really just a storyteller and this is something you just have fun around the campfire on a, on a river trip and you’re spinning your yarns?
PT Wood: (laughs) Yeah. Mostly it’s just telling stories. And that’s, uh, you know, that was, uh, something that, um, I think a lot of that came from being a river guide. And, um, one of my, uh, I think I get a bunch of that also from one of my really good, good friends, Pat, uh, Horton who, uh, unfortunately he died on the Grand Canyon a few weeks ago, uh, in his sleep at Poncho’s Kitchen, you know, kind of the way all Old River guides want to go, although it might have been a little bit earlier.
But he was a, he was a master storyteller, and we were roommates for, for years and years and years, and just, you know, two peas on a po- in a pod. And, uh, I, there was competition to tell stories between the two of us. And I think that really drove a lot of my, uh, practice and a lot of my, uh, desire to keep telling these stories bigger and bigger and to, you know, just kind of be entertaining.
Adam Williams: I’m sorry you lost your friend-
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: … but I’m also glad now that we can share that, that piece of him.
PT Wood: Yeah, yeah. For sure.
Adam Williams: And talk about the storytelling and, yeah. Are there any favorite stories that you remember from the times, uh, that you would tell or maybe that he would, if you wanted to, to share one of his? I, I wonder how much those things are… Uh, you just described them kind of developing over time and getting-
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: … bigger and more entertaining maybe, but-
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: … if, if that’s typically the way you do it, as opposed to, “Let me see what comes outta my mouth now, (laughs) you know, let’s make this up as we go.”
PT Wood: Yeah. A little, a little bit of both of those, right. But then when you, when you nail a good nugget of a story, then that’s when you start to really, uh, develop it over time and tell it again and again. And, you know, you look forward to running into, uh, uh, new people that you haven’t met before so you can tell them the stories and, uh, that kind of thing. And it’s, it’s good. But, um, you know, as far as, I’ve been thinking a lot Pat’s memorial’s in town on the 20th here, and so I’ve been thinking a lot about, about that and if there is a, uh, particular story that’s worth telling at that.
But I, I, as I start to think about it along the timeline, there are so many, and they’re so in depth and they’re so related to each other that, you know, that it would take weeks and months and years to kind of thread that whole thing. And maybe that’s a, maybe that’s better told in a book or something. I don’t know. We’ll see where that lands.
Adam Williams: Yeah. Fair enough. There’s a lot of years of shared experience-
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: … and story in that, it sounds like.
PT Wood: Yeah, for sure.
Adam Williams: As we’ve said, you were mayor of Salida-
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: … that was from two terms, I think those were-
PT Wood: Yep. Two year terms.
Adam Williams: … two year terms.
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: So four years total. And now as county commissioner, you’re around the midway mark of your first term, which is four years, right?
PT Wood: Four.
Adam Williams: Yep. I might be tangling us in our math here, but what we’re talking about is a total of six years so far of local politics.
PT Wood: Yeah. Well-
Adam Williams: Plus, plus any campaigning that went into, to the efforts.
PT Wood: I mean 10 years on the planning commission in Salida before being mayor.
Adam Williams: Okay. So a lot of involvement.
PT Wood: A lot of involvement. Yeah.
Adam Williams: And my question to anybody who gets involved in politics, maybe a little less at the local level, because that seems more, well, you might laugh at this, but civil-
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: … compared to, say, state and then especially-
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: … federal levels. But it’s just my question still is the same as why. And, and I think I ask that from through my personal filter of, I don’t want to have to deal with the criticism. I don’t want to have to deal with the-
PT Wood: Right.
Adam Williams: … the calls from people complaining and whatever all happens. I mean, why do you, why do you get involved in politics and for so many years? Is that something that, I mean, you maybe enjoy is the debate and facing criticism, and the positives that you see as well, of course?
PT Wood: Yeah. Well, I, I enjoy the debate. I’m not sure I enjoy the criticism, but I, I am pretty confident in, in myself, so I don’t take it personally. Um, I got into politics originally, you know, people had been asking me for years, uh, on the planning commission, like, “Uh, you should run for mayor, you should run for mayor.” And I was always like, “A hard, no, no, no, not gonna happen. This is what I’m doing.” And then in, uh, oh, kinda starting in, I think two thousand and oh, 15 or so, something like that, um, there was a, a city council and a mayor there that I didn’t agree with, and I didn’t agree with the direction they were taking our community. And I was pretty vocal about that.
And I woke up one, one day thinking about that, and I was, I was like, “Uh, well, if I’m gonna be, if I’m gonna be a critic and I’m gonna be a loud critic, I have to step up and actually participate.” And, um, that was when I decided I would run for mayor. Um, I thought I had some skills that would benefit the city. I thought I could run a meeting well. I thought I was a decent arbitrary of ideas. Um, and so I got elected and I think I did a really good job. Um, I did that for two years, felt like the city was in a good place, and so I didn’t need to do it anymore. Retired from politics. Um, had given that up.
And then a number of people came to me, um, and asked me to run for county commissioner, um, including, uh, both Greg and Keith, the, um, two of the county commissioners that were, that were still on there and about to be done with their, uh, with their commissioner journey here as they get term limited. And I think that just that calling to public service, um, and people, you know, wanting, wanting me to help the community and me feeling like I had something to offer to help the community was what drove that.
Adam Williams: It feels like the rhetoric in politics has kind of bled down maybe more than it has in the past. I might be wrong on that, I don’t know. But it feels like it’s gotten a bit sharper, even at the local level, a little less grounded in civil debate about the ideas and the ways we’re handling things. Do you feel that, do you feel that’s the case even at the local level now?
PT Wood: I don’t know that I do. I think, you know, there’s, there’s always that a little bit maybe, but I think, um, if you kind of slow down and listen to people and try to think about, um, where they’re coming from and maybe, you know, maybe they’re not having the best day or maybe there’s a decision we’re making that’s gonna directly and significantly impact their future, you know, they’re, they’re, they can be upset and rightfully so. And I think the, you know, that more, um, vitriolic national level, uh, stuff is, doesn’t happen as much in local politics. And I, and I, I think you can, if you actually kind of really get into it and pay attention and listen to what folks are saying, you, you don’t see a ton of that.
Adam Williams: How can we take… Then, if it is more civil at the local level, how can we take that and kind of bring that to the state and national level, which it feels like, at least in my lifetime-
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: … it’s, this is the most difficult time I feel like, for what’s going on in how we handle that? How, is there an optimistic take you have on our being able to improve that?
PT Wood: Mm-hmm. Yeah, for sure. I think you have to, you have to require that of your, of your elected officials. And, um, you, you can’t have this dissent to the bottom, right? You have to hold them accountable to their ideas and ask them, you know, and, and be asking what their ideas are, not who do you like, who do you not like? It’s, you know, are you a serious person with serious ideas? And those are the people you should vote for.
Adam Williams: What are the most pressing issues you feel like we have going on locally here right now? The things that you as a county commissioner are focused on?
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: And I guess as a kind of a, a secondary question, along with that, you are going to be, I would think, the one who’s having to bring two new commissioners up to speed on these issues-
PT Wood: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Adam Williams: … pretty soon. Now we are to, just to make clear, we’re recording before–
PT Wood: Yes.
Adam Williams: … the election, and this won’t come out until after the election, so we’re aware of that transition period, and, but we are not aware of who that’s going to be working with you.
PT Wood: Yeah. There’ll be two new commissioners sitting up at the dais with me, and, uh, so we’ll, we’ll bring them into the fold and, uh, bring them along and figure out what their ideas are and help to incorporate their ideas and their passions into, into what they do. You know, I think right now our biggest, the biggest issues of the day in Chaffee County are, um, they’re the ones we’ve been talking about forever, right? It’s housing, it’s childcare, it’s growth and land use. It’s, uh, our environment and our climate as we’re, you know, we’re in a valley with 7,000 feet of vertical relief. We’re kind of the front range of, of, of, uh, the, the front line of climate change. We are really feeling it here.
We’re feeling, uh, our summers grow longer, our winters grow shorter and warmer. We’re getting less snowfall, maybe more rain, um, in, at weird times. Um, our forests are, are drying out and not as healthy as we would like. They’re, um, being infested by pine beetles and things like that. And so we have these kind of, uh, landscape scale problems that we’re having to deal with. Um, but I think we’re making good progress on it. I think we have, again, the, the right folks that are serious about finding solutions. And as long as we have serious people trying to find serious solutions to these problems, I think we’re doing all right.
Adam Williams: There’s a, is it an, an improved, an updated, a totally new land use code?
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: Where are we in this process? And for me, as a layperson, and I tend to assume I represent lay people–
PT Wood: (laughs)
Adam Williams: … who are listening as well for some of these governmental things in particular.
PT Wood: Right.
Adam Williams: So what is the land use code? What’s going on with it? What does it mean for us?
PT Wood: Yeah. So the land use code is, uh, ideally it codifies what is in the comp plan. And the comp plan describes who we are, what the valley is, and how we would like to see the valley in the future, right? And so the land use ideally will codify that and help us direct growth in a thoughtful and positive way that keeps the things we love about Chaffee County in Chaffee County.
So the, the big open working ag lands, big open and working ag, ag lands, the towns and towns, the big view scapes, the big view scapes open the, the forest healthy, uh, rivers and wildlife corridors, healthy and vibrant. Really working to allow people to live here, preserve the things we love about it.
Adam Williams: It sounds kind of like the push-pull between maintaining, sustaining, preserving what it is we love and have and that there is growth.
PT Wood: Yep.
Adam Williams: And we’re having to accommodate that. And how do we do that? I think that push-pull applies across governance-
PT Wood: Mm-hmm.
Adam Williams: … across time and of course politics and, and, and that push pulling back and forth with each other. How do we look at that? How do you look at that process of this vision is meant to go well into the future. Well, beyond your years as a county commissioner, someone’s gonna come in after you and then after them and after them. How do we look at that effort? You know, there’s not a, a straight line, right?
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: Because not everybody’s going to agree with how these processes unfold, and in four years, 8, 10, 12 years, somebody might be trying to almost undo some of the work you’re doing.
PT Wood: Yeah.
Adam Williams: Like, that’s got to feel challenging and I think it is maybe as a population.
PT Wood: Yeah. You know, there, there are no perfect solutions. We can, we do the best that we can, um, try to find the most equitable solution. Um, but none of ’em are perfect and, but we have to be able to look at the decisions we’ve made and be like, “Whoa, we really did not nail that one. How can we do it better next time?” Or, “Wow, we did pretty good with that one. Let’s see how we can apply lessons learned to future decision making.”
Adam Williams: How about your thoughts on affordable housing right now as a county commissioner, what your role might be in where we are with that now? I imagine a lot of people are looking to you as an elected official to say, “This obviously is a big problem.”
PT Wood: Yep.
Adam Williams: What are you doing? Right? How are you solving this?
PT Wood: (laughs) uh, I solved it. It’s done. By the time this gets out there, it should be-
Adam Williams: That-
PT Wood: … everyone will have a house and be living high on, on the hog. Right?
Adam Williams: That is amazing.
PT Wood: Yeah. Yeah.
Adam Williams: Thank you. Thank you for your efforts.
PT Wood: Hey, no problem. Um, no, it’s, uh, so at the county level it’s a little bit of a challenge, right? Because most of the, uh, development that will ever happen in the county will be on larger acreage pieces, um, that are not really conducive to affordable housing. Affordable housing really com- requires some density, access to services, those kinds of things. It’s hard to do on well and septic on 35 acres, right? Um, but what we can do, and one thing that we’re trying to, uh, build into the new code are things like transferable development credits.
So if you wanna do say something out, out in the country that, um, is a little outside of the code, you can do that by buying some transferable development credits and then that money can go to affordable housing or transversely, you can sell some of your development credits and then someone with a piece of land, uh, either in town or close to the town with services can buy that and get additional density on their property. We’re also making… So lots that are within, that are in the county, but close to municipalities that can be annexed, we are building in some additional density bonuses for affordable housing, um, and then making that process easier.
Beyond that, we’re supporting, we support the Chaffee Housing Authority, um, and we really support both 6A and 6B there. And I know this will come out after the election, so hopefully those will pass. Um, but those will go a long ways towards propping up that organization and, um, helping with affordable housing in the future.
Adam Williams: I’m glad we finally got to talk PT. I’ve wanted to do this for a really long time. I know you haven’t been aware of that, but I’ve had you in mind for a long time and we finally have done it. So thank you very much for talking with me.
PT Wood: Yeah, Adam, it’s been great. It’s been awesome.
[transition music, guitar instrumental]
Adam Williams: Thanks for listening to, We Are Chaffee’s Looking Upstream podcast. I hope that our conversation here today sparked curiosity for you. And if so, you can learn more in this episode show notes at wearechaffeepod.com. If you have comments or know someone in Chaffee County, Colorado who I should consider talking with on the podcast, you can email me at Adam@wearechaffeepod.com. I also invite you to rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcast or Spotify or whatever platform you use that has that functionality. I also welcome you’re telling others about the Looking Upstream podcast. Help us to keep growing community and connection through conversation.
Once again, I’m Adam Williams, host, producer, and photographer. Jon Prey is engineer and producer. Thank you to KHEN 106.9 FM, our community radio partner in Salida, Colorado. And to Andrea Carlstrom, director of Chaffee County Public Health and Environment, and to Lisa Martin, community advocacy coordinator for the We Are Chaffee Storytelling Initiative. The Looking Upstream Podcast is a collaboration with the Chaffee County Department of Public Health and the Chaffee Housing Authority, and it’s supported by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environments Office of Health Equity.
You can learn more about the Looking Upstream Podcast at wearechaffeepod.com and on Instagram @wearechaffeepod. You also can learn more about the overall We Are Chaffee Storytelling Initiative at wearechaffee.org. Till the next episode, as we say at We Are Chaffee, “share stories, make change.”
[outro music, horns and guitar instrumental]
