This story by Aaron Calvin was first published in the News & Citizen on Jan. 21.
The parents of Tate Holtzman, the 3-year-old who died by drowning at Smugglers’ Notch Resort in 2023 while attending a licensed daycare program, have reached a settlement agreement with the resort.
Most of the terms of the settlement are not being disclosed, according to a joint statement between the family and the resort issued Tuesday morning. The family and resort did say that, as part of the resolution, resort owner Bill Stritzler apologized and offered his condolences to Jennifer and Zachary Holtzman for “their enormous loss and continual suffering,” and received their acknowledgement.
The Holtzmans and the resort have also agreed to work together on a memorial for Tate Holtzman that will be located on resort property.
Tate Holtzman died July 6, 2023, after stepping on an unsecured cover near an outdoor splash pad and falling into a below-ground cistern, according to Vermont State Police investigators. He remained trapped for about 10 minutes despite the efforts of teenage lifeguards to rescue him. He sustained critical injuries that led to his death two days after the incident.
An investigation by police did not result in criminal charges being filed, but an investigation by the Vermont Occupational Safety and Health Administration fined the resort more than $21,000 for six different safety violations investigators found concerning the cistern.
An initial investigation into the incident by the Vermont Department for Children and Families found no violations, and a second investigation conducted at the urging of the Holtzman’s found only that the resort did not file an incident report.
The Holtzmans, through their Boston-based lawyer Jennifer Denker, expressed their “disappointment” in the outcome of that investigation.
In repeated statements through Denker, the Holtzmans expressed a desire to see Smugglers’ Notch held accountable for the resort’s “responsibility” in their son’s death. They also hoped to encourage “water safety and do everything possible to prevent a tragedy like this from happening to other young children.”
In the joint statement, the resort acknowledged that it is “responsible for the care of all children in its programs, including Tate Holtzman,” and said that the resort has taken additional steps “to ensure the safety of all children at the resort moving forward.”
By the time the initial state agency investigations into the incident concluded at the end of 2023, a petition organized with the Holtzmans’ blessing called upon the resort to dismantle the splash pad near the underground cistern where Tate Holtzman drowned and replace it with a memorial garden. The petition garnered over 1,500 signatures.
It’s not clear where the agreed upon memorial to Tate Holtzman will be located, but Stritzler said the Cambridge resort is in the process of evaluating the future of their waterpark and aquatic amenities.
Read the story on VTDigger here: Family settles with Smugglers’ Notch resort following son’s drowning death.