By Hank Gross

HIGHMOUNT - As machines were grooming the snow that was being made on the mountain, about 50 to 60 people gathered outside the Longhouse Lodge at Belleayre Mountain Ski Center to protest the Spirit of the Catskill Awards.

The awards dinner, held Saturday evening and known as the Snowball, is a fundraiser for the Belleayre Music Conservatory, and Gov. Eliot Spitzer was a scheduled guest of honor.

Various groups protesting the awards are upset with Crossroads Ventures plan to build a luxury resort in the Highmount area known as Belleayre Resort at Catskill Park.

Last year Spitzer announced an agreement to help move the project forward after many years of delays, and protesters don't think Spitzer or Judith Enck, his deputy secretary for the environment, should accept the award while the project is being reviewed under the State Environmental Quality Review Act.

Spitzer did not come to accept the award, but Enck did.

"The problem is that the governor is accepting an award primarily from supporters and boosters of this private resort, and we think it's inappropriate during the review of the project that he would accept this award at all," said Julie McQuain, communications director for Save the Mountain, a group protesting the fundraiser. "Whether it's him or Judith Enck, who is actually the facilitator of the negotiations. We're quite upset about it."

U.S. Rep. Maurice Hinchey, D-Hurley, attended the fundraiser, and he chatted with protesters who carried signs with sayings such as "Support Hamlets Not King Lear" and "Don't Spit Sir on Our Mountain."

As Enck made her way to the fundraiser she met with McQuain and others including as Judith Wiman, of Friends of the Catskill Park in Phoenicia.

"If you all want to have a meeting with me," assured Enck, "we can make arrangements. Thank you for voicing your opinion."

Enck went inside and the protesters continued to stand in the cold and the blowing manmade snow with their signs.

Wiman said she's worried about what the project will do to the local economy and environment and the Spitzer's willingness to move ahead with it before the environmental review has been completed.

"This agreement was signed while the SEQRA process is still of ahead of us," she said.

The current plan for the proposed project calls for two resort complexes - one with a 250-room hotel and 139 townhouse-style lodging units surrounding an 18-hole golf course; and the other with a 120-room hotel and spa, 60 lodging units in two buildings and another 60 detached units in up to 52 buildings.

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