Marjorie:
This was your strongest piece of reporting to date. Bravo, girl.
Without having to say it out loud, it is a fairly damning example of how vulnerable muni's can be when it comes to "economic development."
Say the right things, drop the hot acronym's, and everyone stops thinking/vetting. Classic.
Very true... even when clawback provisions are built into development/incentive agreements (i.e., the developer/employer pays back X of their incentive package if they don't meet X, X, and X of their promises to the municipality), the damage has already been done in terms of development on greenfields, neighborhood disruption, or infrastructure expansion that allowed the project to begin in the first place. Mechanisms need to be built into the front end of these development agreements, rather than the back end.
Communities that fall prey to those "hot acronyms," as Gene put it, are in for a nasty surprise. The only defense is to get out in front of this stuff first, and define for yourself as a community what kind of development you want. Let someone define it for you with a slick sales pitch, and you're asking to be screwed.
This guy sounds like a bad deal all around. Nicely done, Marj.
I hate to let my opinion of this be colored by my "driving a car in circles is not a sport" bias but I don't really see how this deal would be beneficial to either T or C or Nascar. T or C doesn't have enough lodging for a large crowd (Nascar events routinely bring in crowds of 100,000+, at least in its strongholds). As a result T or C would be left with either building a crapload of hotels which would be mostly empty for the whole year or an undersized crowd for Nascar.
Doesn't seem like a good fit to me, but then again neither do most of the other grand economic developments that (particularly southern) NM undertakes, most especially the ridiculous "Spaceport."
I believe the idea is that it would be a venue for other types of NASCAR events, not the huge races.
Thx Gene. It is classic. Even more interesting is that the TorC City Commission passed the annexation, zoning and master plan on Monday night after having seen that article. What is one to make of that?
Too dazzled by slick marketing and big promises... Calling SunCal... 
Here's the POOP from TrC . . . we have been so busy with Spaceport, Wal-Mart, Sierra Vista Hospital scandal & more - that this development slipped right by us until coming before the City Planning & Zoning Commission. Then all hell broke loose & folks from all over TrC & Sierra County became a "Coalition for Responsible Architecture & Planning (CRAP)." We have this matter under investigation at the New Mexico Attorney General's office, have a recall going for City Comm. Jerry Stagner & 2 petitions to bring the whole "Motorplex" issue to a referendum . . . and are revealing more CRAP every day.
Build it and they will come definitely does not work for auto racing. It's not the track, its the "dates". If you do a little digging at Wikipedia you will quickly find that the corporation controlled by the France family and Roger Penske is running the show. This company bought the Pikes Peak Raceway and another track in Tucson and closed them down. I'm not even sure this snake oil salesman was ever promising public race events, only a "logistics" center. But if you look at the NASCAR calendar only a fraction of the events are in the west. How's that Mel Gibson tire de-vulcanizing thing working out?
Great article, Marjorie. But you need a hundred more hands to find out what's really happening, and a hundred more questions. What happened to the original Hot Springs Motorplex website where Neal made his overstatements? What happened to their then "partner" Humphries (was he replaced?) Why has a little raceway turned into 8K acres of commercial zoning? How is it that 3 agreements selling off the airport, promising water, and intent to annex were signed a year--that means 12 months--before the 7 hour open meeting this month? Please ask more questions if you want the TRUTH.
So hundreds of people saying "no" for 5 years was "silence"? Maybe we need to shout a little louder: Neal is running shell companies and pyramid schemes. His partner who was promising to finance the development with millions of dollars is a gambler who has pyramid schemes within pyramid schemes. And they are all falling apart in the recession. There is a glut of racetracks in the southwest, we don't need any more. And NASCAR said to please stop using their name, they're sooooo not interested. Why do people want to inflict the insanity of the East Coast upon a small desert town where everyone seeks balance as their favorite hobby? In Truth or Consequences we are really good at finding out the truth, so don't mess with us!
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