Tonight, something will happen in Broomfield that even city leaders say they never imagined was possible.
Bonnie Raitt will play a concert in the city – and at a sparkling, brand-new event center bearing the city’s name, to boot.
“It really feels like this event center is putting Broomfield on the map,” said Jennifer Kerr, a spokeswoman for The Chamber Serving the Broomfield Area. “We were just talking, Bonnie Raitt in Broomfield? Who ever thought we would be saying that? It’s very exciting.”
Raitt’s concert is the first official event at the new Broomfield Event Center, just off U.S. 36 between West 112th and West 120th avenues. And for officials who have championed the event center since its inception, it represents the rounding-out of the city as a place to live and work, shop and play.
Coupled with the FlatIron Crossing mall, officials say, Broomfield has increasingly become a destination, not just a place to drive through on the trip between Denver and Boulder. In 2001, Broomfield also became its own county after years of being split among multiple jurisdictions.
“At the chamber, we have kind of called Broomfield ‘the base camp,’ because it’s between Denver and Boulder,” Kerr said. “It started to become a destination spot with FlatIron mall, and I think this (the event center) is just going to complement that.”
Developers broke ground on the $45 million event center about a year ago. The city owns the center and paid for its construction by issuing bonds, to be repaid through tax revenue from the center and a surrounding residential and commercial development called Arista.
Event center developers John Frew and Tim Wiens, who also are developing Arista, have agreed to back the bonds. The arena has to generate $4 million a year to break even, the pair has said.
Two minor-league sports franchises, also owned by Frew and Wiens, will call the center home: the Rocky Mountain Rage hockey team and the Colorado 14ers basketball team. And in addition to Raitt, the center’s managers have lined up a show by Disney on Ice, as well as a tennis exhibition by Venus and Serena Williams.
More concerts and events are being scheduled for the coming year.
“You’re going to probably see a lot more family shows and trade shows in this building versus concerts,” said Trey Medlock, the executive vice president and general manager of the event center, as well as the two sports teams.
Broomfield Mayor Karen Stuart said the center’s family- friendly focus is one of its attractions. For families that don’t want to make the 16-mile drive to downtown Denver – or to pay for the cost of a Colorado Avalanche or Denver Nuggets game once they get there – the event center provides an alternative.
“People in this north area will be able to avail themselves of things they normally would have to drive to Denver for,” Stuart said. “It seems better geared for our area, the full-service suburban community.”
Meanwhile, naming such a venue the “Broomfield Event Center” – when the city could have sold the naming rights – was important to city leaders as a way to create a name for the city, Stuart said.
“This project is important to Broomfield because it is not something many communities have,” Broomfield city and county manager George Di Ciero said in a statement.
Stuart likened the new center – which sports 180,000 square feet, 6,000 seats, 25 luxury suites and its own sit-down restaurant – to a smaller version of the Pepsi Center.
“Yet it is still able to bring in some top-notch entertainment,” she said. “I mean, Bonnie Raitt, my gosh.”
Staff writer John Ingold can be reached at 720-929-0898 or jingold@denverpost.com.
