NEWRY – American Skiing Co. has entered into a management consulting agreement with MeriStar Hotels & Resorts to oversee operations of its lodging properties.

Under terms of the agreement, MeriStar will provide management oversight of all eight of American Skiing’s Grand Summit Resort Hotels, the majority of its resort condominium operations and other lodging properties.

American Skiing will retain ownership of the properties and reservation networks. Hotel and condominium managers and staff members will remain employees of American Skiing resorts.

American Skiing and MeriStar continued conversations regarding possible management agreements for American Skiing’s lodging properties after the companies withdrew their proposed merger agreement in March 2001.

“MeriStar has an outstanding approach to hotel and resort lodging operations,” said American Skiing President and CEO B.J. Fair. “This arrangement reflects our commitment to ensuring that we can deliver the highest-quality experience and services to our guests. It will also allow our resorts to benefit from the installation of MeriStar’s controls and procedures, and to utilize its sales network. We expect that this will help us control costs and boost conference revenues in the off-season.”

Headquartered in Newry, American Skiing is the largest operator of alpine ski, snowboard and golf resorts in the United States. Its resorts include Steamboat in Colorado; Killington, Mount Snow and Sugarbush in Vermont; Sunday River and Sugarloaf/USA in Maine; Attitash Bear Peak in New Hampshire; The Canyons in Utah; and Heavenly in California-Nevada. More information is available on the company’s Web site, www.peaks.com.