Waveyard developers seek an extension

Developers of the $250 million Waveyard water park plan to ask Mesa officials for a two-year extension, but company officials say they have a prospective financial backer for the resort and mixed-use development project.

Interactive: Waveyard planned layout

Waveyard developers told the Tribune Thursday that they have a strong lead for financing the extensive project that would turn a municipal golf course and adjacent ball fields into a water park. Now all they need is more time.

“We do have a very real and very good financial source now,” Waveyard co-owner Richard Mladick said Thursday. “Even if the financing were to come through, we are going to be coming to the council in August and asking for more time.”

Mladick said Waveyard officials need about two more years from Mesa leaders. That time line would ensure their financial backers that the project will receive the necessary attention, he said.

“We’re optimistic that it’s going to pan out,” he added.

Although Mladick would not disclose the name of the potential investor, he said Mesa officials would be glad to know that the project won’t share the spotlight with a previous Waveyard plan to also build a water park in the Middle East.

“Mesa is the sole focus of our planning efforts at this time,” Mladick said, adding that plans for a site in Dubai had recently stalled. “It’s not moving forward at this time; it’s on hold indefinitely because the financial markets over there have been crushed.”

Global recession aside, Mladick said he has already met with the Mayor Scott Smith and other municipal leaders to discuss the possible extension.

Smith said although no official request has been made — and probably won’t be made until the council returns from its break in August — the meeting between city and company officials was an important precursor.

“They came in and talked about what problems they have had, how they lost a year because of the financial markets having been completely dead,” said Smith, who added he would be inclined to support the two-year extension.

Councilman Dave Richins, who represents District 1 in west Mesa, said he was more in support of a one-year extension for the project, which initially had a tentative date to open of 2010.

“I have been supportive of the Waveyard campaign; most of my constituents have generally been supportive of giving them a shot. But two years? In general terms, it’s too long.” Richins said, “but is a one-year extension a better approach?”

Answering his own question, Richins said his first concern was determining what was best for the residents of Mesa.

“I think there are circumstances where I would support a two-year extension, but perhaps revisiting this in a year would be better public policy,” Richins asserted. “It all depends on the terms of the extension.”

Mladick said with the markets in their present condition, even with slow signs of recovery, timing was of the essence.

“We will be submitting a formal request for two years, but hopefully we won’t need that much time,” he said. “We’re working very aggressively with putting the financing in place with hopes to be under construction next year.”

The Waveyard official said permitting for the project alone, along with the different phases of engineering, required giving more time serious consideration.

“Something like a six month extension just would not satisfy our financial partners,” he said.

Mladick said things could be worse for Waveyard’s prospects like so many stalled construction projects and troubled large-scale developments across the country, adding that his company dodged a bullet in the shape of a housing-slump-sparked recession.

“Financing any large project in this environment is difficult; in reality, the banks and credit markets have been closed for the last 14 to 16 months,” he said. “We feel very fortunate that the financing for this project didn’t come together immediately because we would have opened in the middle of the recession.”