Big Burke announcement

[MEtoVTSkier]

I would crawl to get to a bar.........just sayin'........I'm not proud......Don't judge me.......

 

[sugarbushskier]

Nature of the season. Normally a apres beer or two would be second nature and folks wouldn't be worried about steps up or down to bathrooms or bars and just accept it as part of the experience, but not this year! Still got 2 more trips planned over the next two weeks, but what a disappointment. Hopefully Sugarbush and Smuggs early next week (hoping for warm enough conditions to enjoy springish conditions) and Stowe the following week pan out. What a year. 15 days at the end if this works. Oh well....

 

[VTKilarney]

Another article in today's Caledonian Record. The hotel came in under budget but $5.5 million is still owed. The hotel will remain closed for the foreseeable future.


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[thetrailboss]

Can someone post the article?

From What little I've read, it looks like the Caledonian buried the lead yet again. The opening paragraph states that Q owes him $4.2 million. And that the state has $1.3 million in the account that they are not releasing.

Someone needs to queue up the quote from Masskier and others who were adamant that they had fully funded the hotel. It is very clear that they did not.


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[VTKilarney]

Can someone post the article?

From What little I've read, it looks like the Caledonian buried the lead yet again. The opening paragraph states that Q owes him $4.2 million. And that the state has $1.3 million in the account that they are not releasing.

Someone needs to queue up the quote from Masskier and others who were adamant that they had fully funded the hotel. It is very clear that they did not.


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And remember the excuse that the amount was owed because it went over budget? I guess whoever said that was bullshitting as well.

EDIT: It was Big Wave Dave who said this: "And the fact that the hotel is 1.6% over budget and therefore unfunded is a non-event. That number on any project should be considered a victory."

He was right. It was a non event. As in, it wasn't true.

 

[chuckstah]

Anyone ski today? Planning to use a voucher before the trail count goes to zero. Any woods? Bringing my worst rock skis.

 

[Brad J]

Anyone ski today? Planning to use a voucher before the trail count goes to zero. Any woods? Bringing my worst rock skis.

I did ,the groomed was great , natural trails open were very thin, did not even think about woods. Over all was he best groomer skiing all year.

 

[chuckstah]

Thanks. Heading up either tomorrow morning or Monday before the warm up.

 

[VTKilarney]

Agreed that it was the best groomer skiing of the year - by far. I skied Powderhorn once. Once was plenty. The woods are not in play.

 

[thetrailboss]

Just missed it......though my skiing there last week was decent.


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[faQ]

Anyone ski today? Planning to use a voucher before the trail count goes to zero. Any woods? Bringing my worst rock skis.

It's pretty rough.


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[thetrailboss]

Another article in today's Caledonian Record. The hotel came in under budget but $5.5 million is still owed. The hotel will remain closed for the foreseeable future.


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I read the full article and will try to repost it when I can. One idea floated last weekend in our ski group discussion was that Davis knows he can't bite the hand that feeds him, and let's face it, Shumlin is EXTREMELY unpopular. So who do you criticize? The State. This despite the obvious fact that the real issue is that Q did not raise enough money to build it despite their repeated claims that it would open on time and that they had raised the money. And that is exactly what he did here.

With the current situation, the project being $5.5 million underfunded, I place 90% of the blame on Q and 10% on the State. Q knew that he did not have it fully sold when he began and was confident he would fully fund it before the ultimate deadline. He did not. They ran into serious headwinds including other competition, a weak world economy, and the fact that they've already tapped A LOT of these investors. They have been way over confident in their ability to manage these projects based upon the Tram Haus and some of the projects at Jay that look good and have supposedly increased business in the short term. $600 million of projects was very, very ambitious and is now proving to have been overly ambitious. Q deserves blame for that. Free money can lead one to make bad business decisions as appears to be the case here.

I place 10% on the State, at this time, because their reaction might very well have scared off other investors. But we do not know for sure and it is just speculation at this point.

The State does deserve major criticism as to how they have (or have not) managed the EB-5 program. As a poster or two have said, "it is a great Center because investors know that the State of Vermont is running it and overseeing it." Guess what? They weren't overseeing it at all. They weren't being neutral and there was an obvious conflict of interest with the coordinator/regulator supposedly overseeing things one day and then crowing from the rafters as to how awesome the projects were on another day. I think that this really undermined the credibility of the whole program in Vermont.

 

[faQ]

So...skied with the grom today. The lower mountain was really nice today. We met up with some family in town for lunch but silly us, no food at the tamarack until 2:00. We were encouraged to get food in cafeteria and carry it upstairs though. When leaving, my kid wanted to play the claw-game. Whoops, it's broken, there goes that dollar. How about we get some change and play this game over here...whoops, change machine is broken too. Oh...and when you order a drink sitting at a high top, don't think they are going to bring it to you, that's just silly. Did I mention, snow on the lower mountain was really good today? It really was.


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[MEtoVTSkier]

Sad... just so sad.

Someone needs to make an offer that can't be refused...

 

[VTKilarney]

Bill Stenger is talking to someone by the Sherburne lift. Hopefully it's a claw machine repairman.


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[thetrailboss]

Bill Stenger is talking to someone by the Sherburne lift. Hopefully it's a claw machine repairman.


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He's making a sales pitch.....for a $5.5 million investment.

 

[LONGBOARDR]

Bill Stenger is talking to someone by the Sherburne lift. Hopefully it's a claw machine repairman.


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Well with the pink slips he has been doling out at Jay, I can understand why he is hanging at Burke

 

[thetrailboss]

Here's the article....

BURKE — The new $50 million hotel at QBurke Mountain Resort is ready to open for customers. But it will remain closed for the foreseeable future… until the State of Vermont and the hotel’s general contractor can agree on a payment plan. Jerry Davis, president of PeakCM which built the hotel, said this week he is owed $1.3 million from an EB-5 escrow fund the state controls, and another $4.2 million from the hotel owners.

Davis says he trusts the resort owners, Bill Stenger and Ari Quiros, more than he does the state. “These guys have always paid their bill on time to me,” Davis said. Meanwhile “No one can figure out what exactly has been released by the state,” Davis said.Dealing with the bureaucracy and “all this crap with the state,” has also crippled Stenger’s ability to recruit investors, Davis thinks.

Stenger, general partner of QBurke and the president and CEO of Jay Peak, Q Burke’s sister resort,confirmed Friday that there remains $1.281 million “to be authorized by the state.” "This is made up of equipment, retainage, architects’ fees,” and miscellaneous other items, Stenger said.“Q Burke continues to work to payPeakCM and we are makingprogress… Opening date is immi-nent but I can’t say exact date as of today.”

Stenger has returned from a recent trip to Vietnam, where he sought, and says he secured, new investors. “The trip was very good…Investors are very pleased with the business plan, market demand for the hotel, its quality construction and the fact it is opening soon.”

“Most investors in projects have to wait 18 months for the project they invest in to open,” Stenger said.“New investors will be part of a project for less than six months and the project will be open and earning income."

Nobody appreciates the optimismmore than Davis. “That’s great… Ihope he’s right,” Davis said Friday.

Certificates of Occupancy

Davis won’t release the state-is-sued certificates of occupancy until he is made whole. He wants to workout a payment plan to facilitate the hotel opening but, he says, that his company and the state are at least a“half-million dollars apart,” on money he insists PeakCM is owed and what the state has approved.“We’re very proud of the hotel,”Davis said. “That hotel sells itself…it’s complete, came in under budget and will provide jobs and resources for an area that completely needs it.”The project came under increasedscrutiny by the Vermont Agency of Commerce and Community Development (ACCD) and Department of Financial Regulation (DFR), after early EB-5 investors complained to the state about their perceived lack of regulatory oversight of Stenger’s projects. The ACCD and DFR now have power of the pen over all disbursements from the immigrant investor program’s escrow fund for the hotel.

Disagreements

Patricia Moulton, secretary of the ACCD, earlier told the Caledonian-Record that Davis “acknowledged (the firm) had overbilled approxi-mately $480,000 in a February demand letter.”Davis insists Moulton’s characterization of events is categorically false. His lawyer, William Alexander Fead, of Fead Construction Law PLC in South Burlington, wrote a scathing letter asking Moulton to retract statements he characterized as“erroneous and slanderous.”“Having the Secretary of the Agency of Commerce and Community Development state in the public record that PeakCM has ‘overbilled’ is potentially very damaging to its reputation,” Fead writes. “Only a prompt retraction can mitigate thedamage from that inaccurate characterization of PeakCM and of my letter.”Fead added, “As the Secretary of ACCD you are charged with promoting the businesses of Vermont and the business-friendly environment of the state… At great financial hardship, PeakCM and its subcontractors and suppliers have been working to the same end, by completing the (Q Burke) project even though they were not getting paid. This kept Vermont workers employed, and prevented the blight of a partially completed white elephant in the Northeast Kingdom.”Moulton, contacted this week,said she has not responded to Fead’s letter seeking a retraction of her statement, and she had no comment.

 

[oldtimer]

Bear Den Closed- all the usual suspects were at the pavilion on Saturday. A nice time, but it did appear that some were perhaps over indulging?

If I were to look at the most profitable 1,000 sq ft at Burke Mountain, I would have to say the Bear Den. 2 Bluebird days, plenty of regulars who often consume a beverage after (and during?) the ski day- closed.

ALSO- BMA ran some sort of little kid event on Sunday. Mid Burke was backed with people with $- why not service them? This defies even Q'logic.

 

[VTKilarney]

What's mind boggling is that the Tamarack kitchen opens at 2:00 PM on Sunday. Why would you not open it just a couple of hours earlier for lunch?