Greeley Council seeks more information on proposed Cascadia project

GREELEY — For more than a month, Greeley City Council members have been waiting for reports on the expected economic impact of a proposed west Greeley arena-hotel-water park.

According to the city’s economic development director, John Hall, they’ll get the much-anticipated full report Wednesday, Jan. 8.

The Greeley City Council on Tuesday, Jan. 7, expected to learn the economic impact of the proposed $1 billion project that could become the new home of the Colorado Eagles hockey team, while also luring visitors to restaurants, the event center and water park in what developer Martin Lind has called Cascadia.

Hall presented the report to the council, stating that there was a risk of not taking advantage of investment opportunities such as the west Greeley project.

“When we look at current conditions, and you look at recent events, we can readily see the focus has to increase our amenity base, expanding our retail and dining sector to encourage spending locally, encouraging new development, diversifying housing, enhancing tourism and entertainment, and creating a place where we can retain and attract businesses generally, but headquarters businesses specifically.

“The West Greeley project is a unique opportunity to meet Greeley’s challenges and address city goals, and avoid the risks associated with lack of action,” Hall said.

Some council members lamented the fact that they were given only 14 pages of a 114-page report on the economic analysis. The report was not included in the public documents attached to the council’s agenda. Councilmember Deb DeBoutez asked that the entire report be made public, but Hall said it wasn’t finalized yet.

Hall said that report (though not in final form) was in hand for the last seven days, but council member Tommy Butler asked why the council wasn’t provided a copy. Instead, they were given the last 14 pages of the report on Tuesday that for some on the council left many unanswered questions.

“We’re making a very serious economic decision, the largest investment our city has ever made, and I feel like staff has withheld information to give us a rosier picture while we’re giving public presentations,” Butler said during the meeting. “I’d like not to have to make those accusations.”

Hall said staff was still evaluating the assumptions made in it. The city contracted with CBRE to study the economic impact of the project. Hall said the city made its last comments on the report in late December, and didn’t get the updated report until New Year’s Eve at 5 p.m.

Greeley mayor John Gates said he didn’t feel as if information was lacking, and he added that he felt the other councilmembers were being serious in their diligence.

“Cascadia is a huge deal-changer for Greeley, but we have to make sure it’s right for us,” Gates said after the meeting. “I’m very impressed by the scope of the due diligence that both sides are conducting.”

According to Hall’s presentation, the project is expected to create 2,480 temporary construction jobs and 1,300 permanent jobs. The project also was projected to have a $486 million annual impact during the first phase of construction, but apparently only half of that would be localized to Greeley; the other would be an impact to a broader area, as it was a report on the Greeley metropolitan statistical area, which includes all of Weld County. The presentation also stated that the project’s construction would create operations and visitor spending of about $16 million. The presentation stated that the total economic impact from all operations would be $102.6 million.

Councilmember Johnny Olson asked for a more-focused report that discusses the Greeley-specific benefits and risks.

“I’ve seen what the risk is if we don’t do it. But there’s a significant amount of risk that we’ve got to put together that is going to be to our community and to our constituents,” Olson said. “I would say we try to narrow this down to say what is the revenue investment and outlook look for Greeley … They’re going to say what are we going to get from this revenue?”

Contacted via text during his vacation in Mexico, developer Martin Lind said he felt the economic analysis was conservative. “We have seen a lot of these, and while we believe this one is very conservative, it and the feasibility study show the significant viability of the project,” he wrote. “The elephant in the room is Greeley’s vast area undeveloped and the incredible value added to those thousands of acres that this project will bring. The world will see Greeley to be a completely different Greeley if they decide to do this project, and that area will have an enormous sense of economic vitality while the entire city of Greeley will have a sense of community pride and economic optimism never seen before.”

City staffers are working to finalize agreements with Lind, with a final report due to the City Council by Feb. 4, at which time the council also would consider a lease agreement with the Colorado Eagles, a business-incentive agreement and a Water Valley pre-development agreement. First reading and introduction of funding approvals and a line of credit on the project are scheduled for the Feb 18 council meeting.

on Facebook on LinkedIn