Custer set to get new events center

A new events center is in the works in Custer, and will be located on the Hwy. 16 frontage at Buffalo Ridge Camp Resort.
Mike and Bonnie Tennyson, owner of Custer Hospitality, which owns the camp resort and  five hotel properties around Custer, floated the idea of an events center at the July 6 meeting of the Custer City Council. He is proposing to fund the project through creation of a Business Improvement District (BID).
A BID is where local business owners and/or property owners collaborate to fund improvements and marketing. BIDs are authorized by state law and collect a special assessment or occupation tax from district businesses to pay for beautification, events and tourism promotion.
In this case, the district would be Buffalo Ridge Camp Resort and Custer Hospitality’s five hotels. An additional tax would be added to fees at the resort, which in turn would help service the debt, operating services, etc., of the center. 
This format differs from a Tax Increment Finance (TIF) District, which municipalities and counties can use to capture additional tax revenue to make needed improvements. Under a TIF the project costs are paid from the money generated by the tax increment, or the difference between the amount of the property tax revenue before the TIF district is created and the tax revenue generated after.
Under a BID, no property tax money is used toward the project, and the City of Custer and its residents would not pay a dime toward the project or have any financial responsibility.
Tennyson told the council the center would focus on reunions, weddings and business conferences, and would seat 250 people at a sit-down banquet. There would also be breakout rooms, and the Showbarn on the property (formerly home of the Mountain Music Show and Grand Magic Show, among other shows) would be repurposed and scaled down and integrated into the events center in some fashion. A smaller theater will remain.
The center would also have a warming kitchen so food could be catered or brought into the facility to serve. 
“We don’t really want to get into the restaurant business,” Tennyson said. “We have good restaurants in town, so we will use them.”
Tennyson also said Custer Hospitality is in possession of all of the artifacts and replicas from when Buffalo Ridge was Flintstones Bedrock City, and said it’s possible a Flintstones Museum could be put on site coupled with a visitors center, potentially becoming the home of the Custer Area Chamber of Commerce.
Due to licensing laws there can be no profit made off a Flintstones Museum, so entrance into the museum would be free, but donations could be taken, and those would then be funneled to the Custer Community Development Fund, which most recently was used for the West Dam restoration project.
“My understanding is if we form the BID, the BID can develop the property and borrow the money to build it,” Tennyson said. “We (Custer Hospitality) would be responsible for the debt and operational costs. We want to structure it in a way the city would have no financial responsibilities to the debt in any manner. The debt would be guaranteed by Custer Hospitality and myself.”
Tennyson said he would like to see construction on the center begin this fall, with a soft opening in 2027.
“We have huge demand for conference space, reunions and weddings. We get those phone calls all the time,” he said. “Unfortunately we are turning them down.”
Toby Morris, senior vice president at Colliers Securities LLC, joined the meeting via teleconference and lauded the BID technique for funding such projects, calling it a “really great economic development tool” that was used for such projects as The Box in Box Elder, The Lodge at Deadwood and the Spearfish Convention Center.
The city’s only involvement, he said, would be collecting the additional BID tax Custer Hospitality imposes upon itself and then sending it back to Custer Hospitality’s lender to serve the debt. Any remaining funds go toward covering operating expenses.
The proposal did not require formal council action, but the council did endorse the project.
“We’re just looking for informal consensus,” Tennyson said.
The next step will be for Custer Hospitality to petition the city for the BID district and for the city to move forward with a resolution for intent and a public hearing on the potential district.