The landscape between Lincoln and Roseville changed five years ago when Thunder Valley Casino sprung up on Industrial Avenue next to Highway 65.
It's about to change some more. A 24-story hotel, a performing arts center and a new parking structure are among new features coming to the casino in the next two years.
Members of the United Auburn Indian Community, which owns the casino, and local governmental officials celebrated the expansion with a groundbreaking ceremony July 16.
"We're going to have the coolest 650-room hotel," said Scott Garawitz, the casino's chief executive officer. "This will rival anything in Las Vegas."
The tribe has not released an estimate of how much the expansion will cost. However, analysts say it could be as much as $1 billion. Completion is targeted for the summer of 2010, and the expansion will include:
• A four- or five-star hotel featuring an exercise room, spa, pool deck, family center, arcade and tribal cultural exhibit area.
• Two ballrooms totaling 30,000 square feet and capable of hosting 2,000 guests.
• A performing arts center for concerts, theater and trade shows.
• Three new restaurants.
• A nine-tier parking structure for 5,000 vehicles.
• A new poker room and additional gaming space.
Critics say the height of the hotel will be a visual blight in a generally flatland area. Garawitz said the tribe will work with residents from nearby Lincoln Crossing to mitigate the sight of a hotel jutting high into the air.
"We're sensitive to the change that's being made," he said. "We're going to propose the planting of trees and doing landscaping."
He pointed out that there are other facilities in the area that could be considered by some as visual eyesores. "You have a dump just up the road from here," he said, referring to the county landfill at Athens Avenue and Fiddyment Road. "And there's a biomass smokestack across the field from us."
Garawitz said the expansion garnered less opposition than the casino did when it was first proposed. The county received about 20 letters from the public, he said, "and not necessarily all were against (expansion)."
Placer County officials have tried to focus on the benefits of the expansion. They point out that 1,000 new jobs will be created during the construction, with 1,200 new hotel and casino jobs available after completion. Supervisor Robert Weygandt said at the groundbreaking ceremony that the county has received more than $50 million in benefits since the casino arrived.
Elmets, the tribe's spokesman, said the expansion, when completed, will provide $10.2 million to the county in annual revenues in lieu of property taxes. The county now receives $2.1 million annually, he said.
The county and the local economy will receive other benefits, he said. These include:
• About $1 million annually from room occupancy tax.
• About $500,000 more in food and beverage taxes, placing the annual intake at about $900,000.
• About $25 million more in the casino's annual expenditures with local vendors. It spends about $45 million each year now.
• The continuation of paying $1.3 million annually to Placer County for fire protection services and $1.2 million annually to the county Sheriff's Department for safety and law enforcement services.
Call The Bee's Art Campos, (916) 773-2825.
