More than a year after Boonville, Indiana, Mayor Charlie Wyatt announced a major commercial development project for the city — one that is to include a hotel, housing, public safety facilities, and several entertainment elements — it is unclear where the endeavor stands.
The plan Wyatt presented during a Nov. 3, 2023, news conference was to cost $74 million. In early 2024, the estimate swelled to more than $100 million as various concepts were added, including a miniature golf experience with a three-story restaurant and rooftop bar.
Wyatt stated last November that construction would in the third quarter of 2024, with completion in 2026. He said the project would be built with local labor and it would bring jobs and progress to Boonville and the region.
The project’s current status, much like when Evansville Business checked in for the June/July 2024 feature story, remains ambiguous.
Since that initial unveiling, which Wyatt made less than a week before he was re-elected as mayor, Wyatt has declined additional comment. As the third quarter of this year came and went, Wyatt told Evansville Business in a text message that there would be an update “when the private developer wishes to tell you something.”
“I am still working on details, and I have signed a non-disclosure agreement and I intend to honor it,” Wyatt continued in the Sept. 17 text message.
The project is known as EDGE of the Lakes – EDGE is an acronym for Economic Development Generating Education.
As of Nov. 15, no information has been posted to the project’s Facebook page since May 29, and updates about the project had been pulled from the development’s website, which sported a message that the site is “under construction.”
Heavenly Hands Property Services, a Florida company involved with the project, has posted nothing to Facebook since May 27. A video post shared on that day shows two representatives of Heavenly Hands Property Services and Tammy Boruff, who is clerk-treasurer for the City of Boonville, discussing the project.
There also hasn’t been any recent information about the miniature golf element, which was announced in a May 21 news release by Hazards Entertainment, also of Florida.
The release stated that the golf, restaurant, and bar planned for Boonville was Hazards Entertainment’s “first venue in the United States, with plans to scale the concept at a rapid rate.” It identifies Lori Dyer, a native of Boonville, as the founder and CEO of Hazards Entertainment.
Michael J. Ryan, a North Palm Beach, Florida, attorney, wrote to Evansville Business on May 19 as the magazine asked questions about who is steering the overall EDGE of the Lakes project and how the various parts of it will be financed.
In that letter, Ryan described EDGE of the Lakes as “a private initiative” and told Evansville Business “the EDGE will keep you informed once things are finalized.”
Ryan’s letter noted that in April, the City of Boonville created a tax-increment financing district for the area on Boonville’s west side where the development is to locate. The attorney explained that financing from the sale of bonds, up to $25 million, would build onsite infrastructure needed for construction to start.
Ryan said in his letter that the developers were seeking purchasers of those bonds, and “until the bonds are funded it is premature to go to contract.”
Evansville Business reached out to Ryan in October for an update on that process, as well as the current timeline for a groundbreaking. No response was received.
Major elements of the EDGE of the Lakes development plan are a 140-room hotel with amenities, a fire and police station with training facilities, and apartments and condominiums, plus the miniature golf, restaurant, and bar facility, bowling, go-karting, and more.
But after nearly six months of silence from those involved and no groundbreaking within Wyatt’s initial stated timeframe, the project’s status is ambiguous — even to the Evansville Regional Economic Partnership.
E-REP is the chief economic development agency for Vanderburgh, Warrick, Posey, and Gibson counties. When it comes to Boonville’s EDGE of the Lakes project, however, E-REP is out of the loop.
“We’re looking forward to the project’s progress, but at this time have no updates to share,” Josh Armstrong, chief economic development officer with E-REP, told Evansville Business in a Nov. 15 text message.
