COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KOAA) — With the upcoming opening of the Hosmer Visitor Center at the Air Force Academy, the Colorado Springs City for Champions initiative will finally be capped off after 13 years.
Apart from Hosmer, the initiative brought a handful of other venues to Colorado Springs, including the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Museum [USOPM], the Hybl Sports Medicine and Performance Center, Weidner Field, and Robson Arena.
The idea back in 2013 was to boost the Pikes Peak region’s tourism and bring in more tax dollars.
“City for Champions as a vision really started when we learned from the state of Colorado about the Regional Tourism Act,” said Doug Price, president and CEO of Visit Colorado Springs. “And at that time, the Gaylord Hotel as well as the River Walk down in Pueblo had both been given tax incentive financing to build tourism-related projects.”
Price, who’s retiring after having led the city’s tourism agency for 16 years, was there for City for Champions from the beginning.
He said once they found out about the state’s tourism funding bill, leaders in Colorado Springs came together to figure out what they could do to boost the region’s allure.
They first settled on a primary cornerstone venue, which would become the Olympic and Paralympic Museum. But the vision soon morphed into something larger with multiple sites.
“Then, in 2013, we submitted an application to the state of Colorado,” Price said. “And when I say the rest is history, when you think about it, we have gone through Governor Hickenlooper and Polis administrations. We have been through Mayor Bach, Mayor Suthers, and Mayor Yemi. So we've had a lot of elected officials, a lot of different people involved with it, and it was always a vision to say ‘How can we bring more visitors to Colorado Springs?’”
Mayor John Suthers, who took over City for Champions from his predecessor Steve Bach, said the award from the state was basically “seed money.” The application led to $120 million in sales tax increment financing over 30 years, which could be bonded and produce about $80 million in revenue to apply, Suthers said.
The state money wasn’t enough to get all of the projects off the ground, especially since the money had to be divvied up between all of the different spaces.
“The one that got off the ground the quickest and easiest was really the Olympic Museum because they had a lot of donors and foundations,” Suthers said. “A partnership between what's now Common Spirit–used to be Centura–and UCCS put the deal together for the sports medicine facility. So that went pretty smoothly.”
He said the downtown stadium and indoor arena were difficult at first. They had looked at the possibility of publicly-owned facilities, but the math didn’t pencil out financially, he said.
They needed investors, and Suthers was getting pessimistic about those plans, he said. They hadn’t made much progress for about 18 months.
But that same week, his hope had dimmed, he got a call from the Ragain family, who owned the Switchbacks at the time.
“They said, ‘Hey, would you fly to Seattle with us and meet a guy named Dean Weidner of Weidner Apartment Homes, grew up in Colorado Springs, is one of the biggest apartment developers in the United States. He's interested in maybe investing in our team and in a stadium,’” Suthers recalled.
Weidner, who passed away in March, eventually became the full owner of the soccer team.
That same week of the Ragain call, Suthers said Colorado College approached the City and said Ed Robson, a former alum of the school, wanted to invest significant money to build the hockey arena.
“The really tough one to put together was the Air Force Academy Visitor Center because while the Air Force Academy could put their exhibits in there and everything, there was no federal dollars to be had,” said Suthers.
The City had put together a project and was set to sell bonds to finance the visitor center just as the COVID pandemic hit. The bond market fell apart, and they had to wait well over a year before they could sell them and move forward on the project.
Now, with the visitor center officially opening to the public on May 16, the long-awaited initiative hopes to achieve its goals of boosting area tourism.
It’s envisioned to serve as a type of gateway into the region for visitors driving south on I-25.
“One of the things I'm really excited about the visitor center at the Air Force Academy is that people will pull in there and find out itineraries. They're going to find out things to do, and we will be able to disperse people to attractions like [the USOPM] and different places throughout the region,” said Price with Visit COS.
He noted that of the region’s 25 million visitors, only 12 million spend the night. With more attractions, the idea is that the day trippers will be more inclined to stay.
“And the longer you stay, the more you spend,” said Price.
According to 2013 projections from the Colorado Springs Urban Renewal Authority, which was the financing entity for the City for Champions, the initiative had lofty goals, including attracting 1.2 million visitors each year and adding more than 500,000 new out-of-state visitors annually.
Price admitted the numbers need time to hit the mark because COVID threw a big wrench into most projections.
“When these projects opened, none of us were anticipating a pandemic,” Price said. “And so it's been a ramp-up. But when you think about Robson Arena, Colorado College has sold out every home hockey game since they opened. The Switchbacks, their attendance, and season tickets have gone up every year.”
Jariah Walker, executive director of the Urban Renewal Authority, said there were a lot of doubters and critics when these projects were first announced.
But now, with the completion of all projects, he said they’ve been silenced, and the City should take pride. Standing in front of Weidner Field, he reflected on what existed before the stadium.
“This was old industrial warehouses along most of the stretch, and then even after those got demoed, it was just vacant blighted land that was sitting there,” he said of the stadium lot.
“There is a major gateway into our downtown. And so when you have projects like this that really are a beacon of what downtown Colorado Springs and our city is all about, it's a huge game changer,” said Walker. “Even from an economic activity standpoint of people wanting to spend their money, watch soccer games, and explore the rest of our city.”
The original state award given in 2013 stipulated that the City had five years to start progress and 10 years for the five projects to be completed.
Since four met that timeline, leaders like Doug Price said the state seemed to give leeway with the Hosmer Visitor Center. Since progress was being made at the North Gate of the Air Force Academy, the state worked with them to extend deadlines and ensure it was done correctly.
As Price is looking back, especially with his upcoming retirement, he said this is a real sense of closure for him and the region.
“And the other thing I think is a sense of pride is that Olympic City USA, as a brand, is now 10 years old,” he said. “This in particular, Olympic and Paralympic Museum, has been the venue that has really helped bring our brand to life.”
Former Mayor Suthers admitted he hadn’t been a soccer fan beforehand.
He began appreciating the sport more as his daughters played in high school. And once the Switchbacks came downtown, he fully changed his tune.
“One of the great joys of my life now, I am a season ticket holder for the Switchbacks,” said Suthers. “I can't tell you how much joy it gives me to sit in that stadium, in the middle of downtown Colorado Springs, and see what it's done for our city. Seeing all those people flocking in from all over Colorado Springs, and getting behind their professional team. I think it's just been a great shot in the arm. And I think all the projects have had similar impacts on people.”
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