Mount Yonah is a 3,173-foot granite monadnock located in northern
White County, approximately 4.2 miles south of downtown Helen and
approximately 2.8 miles north of Cleveland. Its north face features
a prominent exposed-granite cliff that is, per the Georgia climbing
community's standard classification, one of the most heavily used
technical rock-climbing destinations in Northeast Georgia. The
mountain's peak and upper slopes are within the Chattahoochee-Oconee
National Forest's Upper Georgia Mountains Range; the lower slopes
are a mix of private ownership and U.S. Forest Service land.
The mountain's annual snowfall, per the University of Georgia's
Office of State Climatologist, averages 4.1 inches, measured at the
3,000-foot elevation band. This is, in the historical record, the
total snowfall the mountain has received in an average calendar
year — approximately a third of what Grandfather Mountain, North
Carolina (elevation 5,946 feet, the nearest full-service ski
destination to the south), receives in a single average week in
February.
Mr. Bogdan Pashev is, per the biographical summary on the first page
of his submitted proposal, a 54-year-old naturalized U.S. citizen
born in Blagoevgrad, Bulgaria, who operates, from Tarpon Springs,
Florida, a small family real-estate holdings firm with residential
and hospitality investments in Pinellas County, Florida, and in the
northern Rhodope Mountains of his native Bulgaria.
He has, per the proposal's Exhibit A, not previously developed any
property in the Southeastern United States.
The proposal
Mr. Pashev's proposal, submitted Friday, January 23, 2026, to the
White County Planning Commission at 3:47 p.m. in the Commission's
Cleveland administration office, is 44 pages long, spiral-bound
with a red cover, and titled "Alpine Yonah: A Boutique Ski
Destination For The Northeast Georgia Mountains." Its principal
features, per the proposal:
- Six chairlifts (five fixed-grip double chairs and one
high-speed detachable quad, manufactured by Leitner-Poma).
- 42 acres of skiable terrain, distributed across the mountain's
north face between the 2,400-foot and 3,150-foot elevation bands.
- A 22,000-square-foot lodge in what the proposal describes as
"a northern-Bulgarian-Rhodope architectural register, with accents
of the German-Alpine tradition locally familiar to the Helen
visitor."
- A snow-making system producing, per the proposal's technical
annex, approximately 1,800 acre-feet of artificial snow per peak
season, sourced from the Chattahoochee River via a new dedicated
withdrawal right.
- An operating season of December 15 through March 1, annually.
- An announced soft-opening target of December 15, 2028.
The proposal does not include, in any of its 44 pages, a reference
to the mountain's natural snowfall. It does not address the question
of whether Mount Yonah has, at any point in recorded history,
received sufficient natural snowfall to support commercial alpine
skiing. It does not address the water-supply implications of
withdrawing 1,800 acre-feet annually from the Chattahoochee (which
is, per USGS data, a relatively small mountain stream with a dry-
weather flow of approximately 20-30 cubic feet per second).
It does include, as Exhibit C, a rendered architectural elevation of
the proposed main lodge. The rendering shows, in the foreground,
skiers on a groomed white slope. In the background, the granite
cliff of Mount Yonah is visible, in its actual exposed condition.
The Commission's response
Planning Director Hester Kalb, 66, who has held her position since
1984, was interviewed at her Cleveland office Thursday afternoon. I
asked her whether the Commission intended to formally consider the
Alpine Yonah proposal.
"We consider every proposal submitted under Chapter 7 of the White
County Planning Code," Ms. Kalb said. "Mr. Pashev's proposal has
been assigned intake number 2026-P-0034. It will be scheduled for
initial review at the Commission's February 18 meeting."
Asked whether, in her professional judgment, the proposal was
likely to advance to the approval stage, Ms. Kalb paused. She then
said: "This is the seventh such proposal I have received in my 42
years in this seat. The preceding six did not advance. I do not
know, as an administrator, that the Commission has changed its
mind about the natural-snowfall question."
She added: "But that is the Commission's decision, not mine."
Mr. Pashev, reached by telephone Thursday evening at his Tarpon
Springs office, was asked whether he was aware that Mount Yonah
receives, on average, approximately 4.1 inches of natural snow per
year. Mr. Pashev said: "I have read the climate record. The proposal
does not depend on natural snow."
He did not elaborate on how the proposal would address the
approximately 1,780 acre-feet per year of snow-making water
demand, in the face of the Chattahoochee's seasonal dry-weather
flows of 20-30 cubic feet per second.
He did indicate that he had "prepared for questions."
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