Funding rodeo has city leader 'anxious'

By Zsombor Peter
Staff Writer

GALLUP — The Wrangler National Junior High School Finals Rodeo kicks off in less than three months. The city is looking at a budget well in excess of what it originally expected to spend on preparing Red Rock Park for the event. And there's plenty of more work to be done.

"I'm anxious," City Manager Eric Honeyfield said about the prospects of getting the park ready on time. "I'm very anxious."

The City Council secured the right to host the rodeo a first-time event after signing a deal with the National High School Rodeo Association in November.

All the material for the 1,000 new horse stalls the contract calls on the city to have ready for the rodeo has yet to arrive. And once it does, all that material needs to be installed.

But there's something else about getting the parched, sandy land at Red Rock Park ready for the big event that has organizers most worried at the moment: water.

Getting the 500 camp sites at the park ready by the time the recreational vehicles start to arrive another stipulation of the contract with the Rodeo Association fell to Global Entertainment, the private management firm the city handed over daily operation of the park to last summer. That includes equipping all the sites, both the 250 permanent and 250 temporary ones, with electricity and water.

Global's operations director at the park, Bill Lee, says that may not happen.

Although Honeyfield and Lee say Global has made a lot of progress in that direction, it may not make it all the way.

Global will be able to wire all 500 sites for electricity, Lee said, but it will only get water to 200. And since Global has already committed the $200,000 it was obligated to spend on capital improvements to the park, he said, it can't afford to finish the other 300.

Lee said Global was prepared to serve those sites with a water truck, which would have been cheaper, but the local rodeo committee overseeing the preparations said that wouldn't do.

What Global is saying, in other words, according to Honeyfield, is that getting water to those 300 sites now depends on and will have to be paid for by the city.

But the bigger water-related problem Honeyfield sees coming down the line has to do with just that, the city water line serving the park.

There's only so much water that line can carry out to the park at any given time, he said, and the rodeo, likely to bring some 700 participants to the park and hundreds of more spectators, will put more demand on it than ever. There are engineering solutions to making sure the visitors see more than dirt and dust spill out of their faucets when they turn their taps, he said, but it will take work. And probably more money.

That brings up the budget for the rodeo.

When the City Council approved the deal in November, it set aside $400,000 to get the park physically ready to handle the participants, their animals, and the crowds based on the rough estimates of the rodeo committee and $85,000 to cover the operational expenses.

Those figures have not stood up to time.

The horse stables and roof panels that will cover them have cost nearly $400,000 alone.

As of Tuesday evening, all the capital preparations going into the rodeo looked to cost $630,000, and operations another $135,000.

The council has been criticized for entering into the contract with the Rodeo Association and committing $400,000 worth of public funds of taxpayer funds not knowing, but having been warned about, how much more it would all cost.

Thanks to some spare capacity in two bonds the council approved in 2003 and 2004, and the very low interest rates it received on the latter, Assistant City Manager Larry Binkley said there was enough money to cover the overrun. Another $300,000 from the city's lodgers tax revenue, earned on local hotel stays, has also been set aside.

And if it's lucky, the city may even have some profits in the end to help pay the bills.

The council approved a profit-sharing plan with Global Tuesday, but it's not something officials are counting on using.

Although earning a profit on the rodeo looks unlikely, Lee said, "we could be wrong on that. It's a first-time event, and we're kind of blinded on that."

Honeyfield would not even speculate on the odds.

For all the work to be done and thetight deadlines, rodeo committee chairman Dudley Byerley, at least, was upbeat.

Despite the potential water crunch, "the (Rodeo Association) people are still excited," he said. "It's going well. Everything's cool."

And whatever the costs or profits, the City Council is promoting the rodeo as a economic boon for the local economy, a new event promising to pump millions of dollars into area businesses.