A proposed multi-million sports complex will not be coming to Bargersville, as town officials didn’t see any way to provide the nearly $1 million in financial incentives being requested each year for the project.
In 2016, developers proposed building and managing a sports complex in Bargersville, on 2 Cent Road off of State Road 135, which would have included six outdoor fields and 10 to 12 indoor courts, a restaurant and space for physical therapists. They estimated the new facility would have brought in 875,000 visitors per year, who would stay at nearby hotels, eat at local restaurants and shop locally.
But the developers, Klipsch-Card Athletic Facilities, also wanted the town to commit to spending $950,000 per year for the next 20 years to lease the facility during its slowest hours. Klipsch-Card said the financial commitment was necessary for the project to succeed in Bargersville.
The town would be able to recoup some of its costs by renting the facility during non-evening, weekday hours, the developers told town officials.
The town could not commit that much money commit as an incentive, and though officials did attempt to reach out to schools and other groups to gauge interest in the facility, they didn’t find enough potential users to cover the amount of money the developers were requesting, council member Ken Zumstein said.
The developers told town officials earlier this year that they that they were no longer considering Bargersville as a potential location for the project, Zumstein said.
The developers didn’t return a call seeking comment.
Bargersville still aims to focus on improving its residents’ recreation opportunities, Zumstein said. Last year, the town approved new fees charged to home developers that will be set aside for building new parks and trails, and the town recently created master plan for its parks system to direct where that spending will be going, he said.
The current owner of the land now has the property listed for sale. Prior to being considered for a sports complex, the area had been looked at as a potential site for industrial development, something Zumstein said they would like to see in that area.
