Business
GBAD To Hold Onto Cash, Ahlquist Asks City To Make “The Sky The Limit”
September 3, 2020 
The Greater Boise Auditorium District held a special board meeting Tuesday in which they decided to hang onto their cash reserves until the COVID-19 and slow hotel and convention business did a “pivot.”
This came in the wake of an attempt by Tommy Ahlquist and his Ball Ventures Ahlquist development firm to recruit GBAD to join in a move to develop the county-owned fairgrounds into a commercial and residential project along with a ballpark.
Executive Director Pat Rice told the GUARDIAN, “The merits of the Stadium Project, or ANY project, is not the consideration but frankly the financial position of the District and conditions within the Hospitality Industry are. We can’t sacrifice the level of quality that’s been maintained at Boise Centre and while 2021 will remain a challenge, we have significant capital projects of $1.5-$2M over the next 2-3 years that will require the cash on hand. I do, however, project 2022 to be a phenomenal year and I hope that comes to fruition; we need to be ready.”
The GBAD board also sent a letter to Ahlquist saying they will not consider Ahlquist or anyone else who could cut into their cash position.
The GBAD letter: 90120 letter to tommy
Meanwhile there was more opposition to Ahlquist developments from Preservation Idaho over a proposed project on 4th Street between Idaho and Bannock. The advocacy group sent out an email to members Thursday asking members to write to the City opposing the rezone.
Ball Ventures Ahlquist seeks to rezone the area to allow “unlimited height restriction” in an area where the current height restriction on the property is 6 stories (65’).
On September 21 at 6PM, the Boise Planning and Zoning Commission (P&Z) will hold a hearing to review the Ball Ventures Ahlquist (BVA) proposal for a rezone to allow a 232-foot tower on 4th Street between Idaho and Bannock.
This will be a hybrid meeting that you can attend virtually or in person.
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Comments & Discussion
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Sep 3, 2020, 1:36 pm
Boise City should fund a whole bunch of expensive cool projects for BLM to smash and burn once the city is successful at fostering that organization past critical mass. Then we can be a real progressive city like Seattle and Portland.
Sep 3, 2020, 2:35 pm
Comments like ‘Real Progressives’ add nothing to the conversation and are not constructive.
Developers keep looking to GBAD for easy money. And while the last election and referendum regarding public spending on $5 million on stadiums do not directly impact GBAD, the public’s tolerance to sweetheart deals is waning. I can not believe it has taken GBAD this long to issue a statement like this.
Sep 4, 2020, 8:56 am
Major League Baseball wants to do away with short season rookie ball and low level minors. At this point we do not even know if the Boise Hawks will exist in 2021. No team ends the debate on the stadium
Sep 4, 2020, 11:34 am
I thought King Alquist wanted to build this on the fairgrounds site??
All he is doing is slumming for all the cash he can find – just like he did downtown!
Now we find out Clearwater Analytics wants to sell itself after getting in $15 million worth of infringement trouble. And by the way the owners of Clearwater are “buddies” with Tom!
The cabal continues to be alive and well.
Sep 4, 2020, 6:00 pm
Dave is correct. The MLB even advised minor league teams to not schedule any large stadium project or long term plans extending beyond the 2021 season.
Nevertheless, the multimillionaire owners will do just about anything to get someone else to finance their white elephant boondoggle.
Remember what Nancy Reagan said, “just say no!”
Sep 5, 2020, 2:13 pm
Just use the BSU ball field when they build it! It will be empty most of the time anyway!
EDITOR NOTE–As we see it, the issue if over development at taxpayer expense rather than baseball and soccer. The GUARDIAN will make an offer to pay ten times the rent currently paid by the Hawks baseball team–that would be $10 a year!!
Sep 8, 2020, 7:08 am
Until the ground settles from all the wokeness in today’s sports institutions forcing people to find other things to do for entertainment, not to mention whatever popup pandemic can be screamed like fire in the theater, I would be very hesitant to trying to develop a stadium project. Any business venture that relies on the gathering of masses to make that project work should be considered very risky seeing just how easy it is to command people on flimsy evidence that we have to shut down whole economies. Now we have the CDC quietly adjusting their numbers to where reality and those who called BS on this thing along time ago, reside. SIX PERCENT of the overall number of 150K+ touted as dying from this flu is the real Covid death claim. Just like any OTHER flu has a co-morbidity affect on a vulnerable person, this “special and novel” flu had been transformed into Michael Crichton’s Andromeda Strain just so political enemies of the President can destroy his seat in the White House. I am far from being alone in this view. Everyone who can count the growing list of failed attempts to thwart Trump can see what this is about. Now we are all supposed to vote on ballots mailed out willy nilly. No chain of custody, and you have ballot harvesters that will take charge of your anonymous ballot for you. This is fraud central. We have already seen huge mail ballot fraud in New Jersey this year.
And I will defend the comment at the top that rightly pointed out that we had all better be on guard for the absolute danger stemming from the Marxist religion that takes its sermons to open air restaurants and runs customers off while they chant their demands and slogans, on top of the burning and looting that NPR likes to make us consider as acceptable. We have wanna be mayors proclaiming that they are “ANTIFA” in Portland. The acquiescence of these criminals by “leaders” and Media is astounding. I saw the roots of this in the Occupy movement and boy has it taken fire….literally.