Selection committee weighs final convention‑center recommendation after new bond estimate and late FargoDome proposal

Charlie Johnson, chair of the selection committee, said the group must decide whether to move forward with final rankings despite new funding information and a late proposal submitted to the mayor.

Johnson said consultants from Baker Tilly provided a bonding estimate based on a 25‑year structure using a 5.5% interest assumption, down from the 6.25% figure used earlier. City finance staff reported that, under that formulation, lodging‑tax proceeds could support a $45.3 million construction fund plus a roughly $5 million debt‑service reserve and still leave capacity to fund an operating shortfall of about $500,000 in the first three years and $350,000 thereafter. "That's based on interest rates today," Susan Thompson of City of Fargo Finance said, cautioning that market rates could change.

Johnson also told the committee he had learned that FargoDome project sponsors submitted a slimmed‑down version of their proposal to the mayor after the committee deadline. Johnson said he would not include that late version in his own scoring because it arrived weeks after other submissions, though he shared it so the commission would not be surprised. "It was too late," he said.

Several committee members said the late timing and inconsistent financial line items made scoring difficult. "It felt rushed to me," committee member Dave Peppercorn said, citing mismatched financials and missing line items across submissions. Others said the committee's job is to provide a ranked recommendation while city staff conduct post‑selection due diligence and negotiate final agreements.

On substance, multiple members said visitor experience was a top criterion. Several preliminary rankings mentioned Brewhalla and the downtown proposal as close front‑runners, with Enclave typically third and FargoDome behind them for operational or commitment‑clarity reasons. Members raised operational concerns they expect will be addressed in negotiations, including calendar conflicts for venues already booked, event turnover time, load‑in and truck access for trade shows, and whether hotel commitments are sufficiently firm.

Mayor Tim Mahoney said recent changes in the financing assumptions had material effects: under the 5.5% scenario, one developer informed the mayor it no longer needed $5 million in TIF funds, altering how that proposal compares fiscally to others. Committee members requested apples‑to‑apples line‑item comparisons from staff to aid scoring and to make those financial differences transparent to the commission.

To give developers a final chance to respond, Johnson asked that updated pro formas or summaries reflecting the new funding assumptions be sent by close of business today or, at the latest, tomorrow morning. Staff set an internal deadline for committee scoring at 10:00 a.m. Friday and scheduled a public reconvening at 1:00 p.m. Friday to review scores and decide what to present to the city commission on Monday.

The meeting closed with thanks to committee members and recognition of tensions over timing and transparency; staff apologized to developers for last‑minute glitches and emphasized that any final recommendation will be subject to the commission's review and to subsequent negotiations and legal agreements.