This is the final installment in my attempt to transcribe a poor-quality audio recording made during the September 17, 2015 executive session that included the Pagosa Springs Town Council and two members of the Springs Partners LLC: Bill Dawson and Matt Mees.
If you have read the previous installments, you’ve probably discerned that the September 17 meeting was part of a negotiating process concerning a proposed bridge and road onto and through the Springs Partners’ vacant 27 acres south and west of the Springs Resort. Although the Colorado Open Meetings Law permits a government board to meet behind closed doors to “instruct negotiators” and “develop a negotiating strategy,” I filed a complaint last year in District Court, arguing that the law does not allow the entire Town Council to negotiate directly with a developer during a non-public executive session. Judge Greg Lyman agreed with that argument, and ordered the audio of this illegal meeting to be made public.
We are now listening to Bill Dawson address Council member Kathie Lattin’s question about what, exactly, the Springs Partners are financially capable of developing, on the 27 acres, without the need to bring in additional investors:
“But the hotel is going to take $20 to $25 million. So we need to put a group together. And it’s going to be interesting participating in that and building a hotel. And we have some really good plans — more plans than we need — to get the proper financing to do it all.”
Partner Matt Mees:
“And Kathie, the climate is better now than it ever has been. The last five years, it’s been really tough for anybody who wanted to do anything. [inaudible; something about the bridge proposal]. But the climate has changed, and we now have a window of opportunity that will allow us to grow as a town.”
Ms. Lattin thanked them, and Mayor Don Volger asked if anyone else on the Council had questions.
Council member Tracy Bunning spoke next:
“I’ve known the two of you a long time, and I have… I trust you. I trust your word. But I’m a little concerned, perhaps, with David [Schanzenbaker’s] comment, and with what you’ve said. And I understand. I understand that you can’t write a check for $25 million, and start on the hotel tomorrow.
“Is there any assurances that you’ve thought about, or ways that you could.. in other words, what I’d like to hear is that the two of you — or the three of you — are going to remain in control of this project… and not become minority partners where you really don’t have that control.”
As you may recall from Part Six, Council member Schanzenbaker had expressed his concern that the Town taxpayers might build a $7 million bridge and roadway, only to then watch the Springs Partners turn around and sell the still-vacant 27 acres at a tidy profit.
Matt Mees:
“I’ll try and answer that question … [inaudible; something about ‘Bill and Jack’] … I think that, to get this project done, the people that we would want — or that we would want — to invest in this, are going to be people who will want Bill and me and Jack [Searle] to be driving the ship. They’re not going to know how to drive the ship. This is something we’ve been looking at, and trying to get developed, for the last 20 years. And I think, bringing in an investor — we will put in the first $6 million into the project … [inaudible] … a stand alone project … [inaudible] … and obviously, we need to bring investors in, if we want to make a splash.”
Obviously, if the Springs Partners are limited to $6 million, and the entire project is estimated — by the Partners — at $200 million, there is a slight need for additional investors.
The next short segment of the audio is unintelligible. Then we hear Mr. Mees say:
“And this, bridge, if it happens, if you go forward with it — the action of it, plus us starting something else, is just going to create a lot of action.”
Considerably more action, presumably, than we’ve seen in the rest of downtown Pagosa, right along Highway 160 — the only major east-west highway in this corner of Colorado.
“It’s going to take probably 18 months to build the bridge, according to Mike Davis [of Davis Engineering,] so by the time any of this stuff got put together, we’re looking at two years or more. I mean, we can’t even go and talk to investors right now, without knowing something. So I would say, to answer your question, we want to be involved, unless something dramatic happens — we want to be in the forefront of it.”
As we’ve heard just now, Bill Dawson and Matt Mees have wanted to see the vacant 27 acres developed for the past 20 years — but apparently couldn’t make it happen during a period when Archuleta County was one of the fastest-growing counties in the nation, and while the population was doubling to 12,000 residents. But they were (apparently) very happy to sell the entire parcel to the Whittington family in 2007 — and allow someone else to take complete control of the project.
But now that downtown landlords are struggling to collect cheap rents on commercial properties along Highway 160 — and now that the Whittingtons have handed back the 27-acre property and said, ‘No thank you’ — Mr. Mees wants to assure our Town leaders that the Springs Partners are eager and ready to do something they couldn’t accomplish at the very height of Pagosa’s economic growth spurt.
Sorry if I sound cynical.
Mr. Dawson:
“The important thing is, we want to keep control over architectural… keep architectural input, so that we get a consistency in the overall thing. And that’s very important…”
The next part of the Mr. Dawson’s testimony is somewhat garbled, but it sounds like he is telling the Council that the Springs Partners maintained a minority interest in the Springs Resort? And were in charge of building out additional geothermal features, even after the sale of the resort to the Whittingtons? Mr. Dawson seems to be suggesting that majority investors who join a future development effort will allow the Springs Partners to control the development, “because they know we’ve done this before, and been very successful. The Springs Resort is a great business.”
The Springs Partners do have experience; they once remodeled an existing run-of-the-mill motel into a successful resort. I’m not sure they’ve ever built out a $200 million mixed-use development. Such a thing has never been done in Pagosa, I’m pretty sure, although the developers of Aspen Village gave it the old college try, and thus far have failed.
Mr. Dawson:
“It’s our intent, Tracy, to be as involved in this as possible.”
Mayor Don Volger then asks for additional questions from Council, and hearing none, thanks the Springs Partners for attending the meeting. Town Manager Greg Schulte subsequently notes, for the record, that Mr. Mees and Mr. Dawson have left the room, and we hear someone say, “Let’s eat.”
I would guess: pizza — based on 11 years of writing about Town Council meetings.