By Warren Epstein
It was a moment Gary Fentiman will never forget. It was 2017 and he was working as Jay Cimino’s chief operating officer of the Phil Long Ford automotive group.
Cimino turned to Fentiman and proclaimed, “I want to buy a mountain.”
“You what? … Buy a mountain?”
Long pause.
“You have 90 days to find out how to fund it,” Cimino said. And the Cimino group got to work.
The Mountain
In 2020, Fishers Peak opened as Colorado’s second-largest state park, standing as a towering legacy of a man dedicated to reviving his beloved hometown of Trinidad.
In a recent article, we explored an overview of Trinidad, looking at its ever-changing personalities as well as its arts scene and natural wonders.
Today, we look at the legacy of a man, best known for his car dealerships in Colorado Springs, Denver, Glenwood Springs, Trinidad and Raton, New Mexico, who created a mountain of hope in the southern Colorado town.
Getting out of Town
Jay Cimino was born in 1936 and grew up in Trinidad, where just about every kid rode a bike over gravel roads and knew the family behind every door knocked on for Halloween. His dad had told him that if he wanted to make something of himself though, he would need to leave.
“You can’t stay in this town,” his dad told him (according to his daughter Gina Cimino). “There’s no opportunities for young people here.”
He took that advice, leaving after high school to join the Marines. He came back for two years, attending Trinidad Junior State College (now Trinidad State College) before heading out of town again to study business at the University of Denver.
After graduation, he married his college sweetheart, Emily Roitz.
Soon after college, the rubber hit the road to his lifelong career in the automotive business, starting with a management position at B.F. Goodrich. In 1975, he joined Phil Long Dealerships’ founder Phil Long as his partner and general manager of one Ford dealership. Over his 49-year career, Cimino grew the dealership to 18 locations, making Phil Long Dealerships the largest privately owned automotive group in Colorado. Although his home was in Colorado Springs, Cimino dedicated the last two decades of his life to helping his hometown.
Fentiman estimates Cimino’s investments in Trinidad at more than $80 million, and that doesn’t include all the sweat equity the Cimino family and their partners put in.
He often returned to Trinidad to visit family and friends, and he was sad to see boarded storefronts and a fragile economy that seemed a lot more bust than boom.
“It was thriving when he was a kid, and that’s what was driving him,” says Gina Cimino. “He wanted to bring it back to what he remembered, a city of champions.”
In the early 2000s, with both of his parents deceased, Jay got word that his childhood home was up for sale. He bought it, renovated it and began using it as a headquarters for his investment and philanthropic work in Trinidad.
In 2008, he started working closely with his daughter Gina to help Trinidad. It was in bad shape. The economy was stalled. The roof of the church Jay had attended as a boy had caved in, and the diocese put it up for sale.
“Guess who bought the church?” Gina asks. “After studying the needs of this poor, underserved community, it wasn’t difficult to see that the biggest need here was healthcare.”
Indeed, Las Animas County’s healthcare was rated second to last in the state, with half of its residents going out of town even for simple medical attention. Gina and Jay had a plan to renovate the old church and turn it into a clinic. They approached a major healthcare system to run the clinic, but after management changes, their proposal was rejected.
“But we couldn’t walk away,” says Gina. “I asked my father, ‘What is our next step?’ He said, ‘We run it ourselves.’ We hired a management company, doctors and nurses. We had key staffers Ashley DiPaola and Felix Lopez, who helped us lay the foundation for our nonprofit.”
In 2011, Mt. Carmel Wellness and Community Center was born. In 2018, the group approached the CEO of Salud Family Health, who was from Trinidad. He agreed to take over the center’s medical services, and in 2022, added dental services. With a federally qualified health center as its partner, the Cimino team focused on the wellness portion. Today, Mt. Carmel Wellness and Community Center has expanded to become a healthcare campus, where residents can participate in more than two dozen free or low-cost wellness programs.
Alongside the health center, another dream became reality. Since his time in the Marines, Jay had a vision of helping other veterans. Along with retired Col. Bob McLaughlin, his family and staffers, Cimino established Mt. Carmel Veterans Service Center in 2016 in Colorado Springs to support active military members, veterans and their families as they transition into civilian life, seek gainful employment and face emergent needs.
A Mountain of a Plan
Cimino’s largest, most ambitious Trinidad initiative began with that conversation between Cimino and Fentiman to purchase what would become Colorado’s second-largest state park.
Through all the booms and busts of the old mining town, Cimino saw the way forward. The way to sustainable economic growth was through tourism, and he saw Fishers Peak as the key.
“He knew we sit on this gateway to Colorado on the I-25 corridor, with thousands of cars coming through every day,” says Cy Michaels, Trinidad hotelier and Cimino friend. Michaels later became part of the ownership group of the Hilton Garden Inn and serves as a hospitality consultant to the chamber and tourism offices. “He knew we had to get them to stop, get gas and a bite, and then discover this wonderful slice of Americana in Trinidad.”
He also knew what a mountain park could do to bring in more of those drivers. Towering over the city at 9,633 feet, the highest spot between Trinidad and the Atlantic, Fishers Peak had been owned by the Crazy French Ranch (questions of sanity aside, that was the name of the incorporation), led by a widow in Santa Fe. Cimino and Michaels visited her, shared their ideas, and she was amenable to the sale. To get the ball rolling on fundraising, Cimino formed a group of impassioned individuals consisting of family members, community stakeholders and local city representatives (later called the Gang of 14).
They took a jeep tour up the mountain. The beauty of the forests, meadows and the abundance of wildlife (along with Cimino’s passionate vision) convinced the gang of the land’s importance to the community.
Then former Mayor of Trinidad Phil Rico (one of the Gang of 14) asked the Trinidad City Council to approve pursuing the purchase. They voted yes. State agencies and trusts eventually purchased the 30 square miles of mountain for a little more than $25 million in 2019. Gov. Jared Polis, thrilled about adding a new — and uniquely untouched — state park to Colorado, signed the executive order to fund Fishers Peak.
The park officially opened in October 2020, with limited access and trail development underway. Currently, one trailhead and one picnic area are open, leading to 13 miles of trails, accessing roughly 250 of the available 19,200 acres.
Once the park is fully developed for hiking, biking and hunting, researchers at Colorado State University estimate that more than 170,000 people will visit annually, generating more than $18 million in local business revenues for Trinidad.
Beyond the Mountain
Cities like Colorado Springs had visionaries, including Spencer Penrose, but Trinidad had no such champion for its community. Motivated to fill that void, Jay Cimino founded the Trinidad Community Foundation in 2006, with a goal of gathering people who are driven by mind, body and spirit to move the community forward into the future.
Along with his family and other collaborators, Cimino focused on uplifting Trinidad through various partnerships, nonprofits (a fourth one he founded is Sister Blandina Wellness Gardens, a spiritual retreat free and open to the public in downtown Trinidad), historic preservation, economic development, education and recreation.
Jay Cimino died in February at 87 years old, but his legacy investments in Trinidad continue.
Building on the outdoor recreation promise of Fishers Peak State Park, Cimino initiated plans for a riverwalk park along the Purgatoire River, which the city has taken on.
Cimino also expanded the tourism infrastructure to handle an increase in visitors, building a Hilton Garden Inn, Club 14 Garden Grill and Pub, The Marketplace (a food hall and a bar that serves as a business incubator), The Stock House event center and The Champions Center (a collection of businesses and the county chamber of commerce, housed in a restored bank building).
He also established the Downtown Trinidad Development Group and co-founded the Trinidad Construction Group with Karl Gabrielson to facilitate the expected growth.
“Right now, we’re working on the old Catholic school,” Fentiman says. “With luck, that’ll soon be rent-controlled, affordable workforce housing.”
Restoring historic buildings to revitalize Trinidad was a passion for Cimino and his partners. In addition to the restorations, Cimino created an automotive course track, including donated equipment, to his alma mater, Trinidad State, and encouraged his people to be champions in the community.
The city of Trinidad honored Cimino’s dedication to his hometown by putting his name on the Downtown Family Park and Playground, and adopted a Memorial Resolution honoring his life and legacy. He was inducted into the Trinidad State Junior College Hall of Fame in 2012. The Pikes Peak chapter of the American Red Cross named Cimino humanitarian of the year for his work in Trinidad.
“He had so much love for this community,” says his daughter Gina, who serves as president of Mt. Carmel of Colorado as well as Kip Hampden Properties in Trinidad. “We’re dedicated to keeping his legacy alive in Trinidad.”
