Glendale and Rugby: a bid for greatness

By James Paton, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Friday, June 20, 2008

Photo by Linda McConnell © Special To The Rocky

Infinity Park is Glendale's new stadium for rugby matches. The facility will also include a sports and events center. Known for its SuperTarget and strip clubs, Glendale aims to draw an international audience. Mayor Larry Harte said, "Hopefully, people will look back and say, 'Wow, that was a bold move that worked.' "

Visitors to Glendale may wonder how this speck of a city ended up with a new rugby stadium that can seat all of its 4,800 residents and then some.

Or how a community known for big-box retailers and topless bars embarked on a roughly $40 million mission to redefine itself and to become an international rugby capital.

If they ask around, they'll find Mike Dunafon, a burly man with big ideas. The football-player-turned-rugby enthusiast is seen as a key catalyst.

"Glendale is a unique little place," Dunafon said recently. "But it had nothing but businesses. No attractions to get people to stay in the hotels. This community punches above its weight. We had a chance to get a coalition of people together to make things happen."

Dunafon, 54, gushes about the new Infinity Park giving Glendale a stronger identity, uniting its citizens and attracting rugby teams from all over the globe. The tiny municipality also is creating the World Rugby Hall of Fame, "a bit of a cheeky move," he acknowledged, considering other countries, namely England, have richer rugby histories.

Dunafon has sought to shake up Glendale before.

Calling themselves the "raptors," Dunafon and his cohorts targeted City Hall in 1998. They successfully fought a move to impose restrictions on Glendale's strip clubs, stirring up controversy along the way.

Several years later, they and others entertained another bold plan, this one focusing on rugby.

Dunafon is a city councilman. Debbie Matthews, his common-law wife, is owner of the Glendale strip club Shotgun Willie's. Chuck Bonniwell is the publisher of the community paper, the Glendale Cherry Creek Chronicle. The three are among the decision makers in the 355-acre enclave surrounded by Denver.

The concept for a rugby facility has become a reality. The city secured the financing. Sponsors have lined up. Fans have arrived. A fitness center on the site is about to open its doors. And the city has its own rugby squad - the Glendale Raptors.

Still, they have encountered at least one setback: losing coach Geoffrey Old, the former star of the New Zealand All Blacks, amid a legal dispute with Dunafon.

Finding the money

Ultimately, Dunafon and his colleagues had few people to convince.

The city bypassed voters and opted for financing that did not need their approval. Glendale in 2006 issued about $21 million of debt to pay for the project, including the stadium, the recreation center and the purchase of five acres in Seminary Park.

Glendale estimates that the final cost, with interest, will be closer to $34 million.

The city sold "certificates of participation," a sometimes-contentious tool used in the past by a number of municipalities in Colorado. Lakewood relied on that financing about a decade ago to build a new city hall.

Glendale, home to a SuperTarget, a Home Depot and a Sports Authority as well as the adult shop Fascinations and the strip joint Penthouse Club, will set aside a portion of its budget each year to repay the debt. Glendale reeled in about $10 million in sales tax revenue last year, a large sum for such a small city.

One possible worry beyond Glendale's control is the economy. With dense commercial activity, the city is exposed if consumer spending slows significantly. Two retailers alone - Target and Home Depot - contribute more than 40 percent of the city's sales tax revenue, according to documents detailing the debt offering.

Glendale, led by Mayor Larry Harte, also must pay to maintain Infinity Park. The city expects the facility this year will pull in $1.5 million in revenue, not enough to offset the $2 million in costs. Still, the city hopes sponsorship money, by 2010, should eliminate that deficit. If someone writes a check for naming rights, that would further improve the situation.

The rugby facility, featuring a Jumbotron, is at the heart of the project to re-brand the city, a one-time community of dairy farmers incorporated in 1952. The complex, which accommodates about 5,000 - and many more with temporary seating - also will host movie nights and concerts, city officials said. Opie Gone Bad and Chris Daniels & the Kings are on the calendar this summer.

The World Rugby Hall of Fame, a name Glendale trademarked, is expected to open later.

Veggo Larsen, the city manager between 1998 and 2002 who said he left amid a falling-out with Dunafon and Bonniwell, questioned whether the revenue streams in the future would be enough to handle the debt.

"Is there a sense in the community that there's a certain folly in having such a massive rugby facility?" asked Larsen, who was brought in by Dunafon but later dismissed because of alleged threats he made against a councilman. "It's a curiosity any entity that small could even afford it. Even if you can, is this is what should be done with this much money?"

Mayor Harte said the city, which relied on underwriter Stifel Nicolaus, studied the plan carefully, gained the community's support and tried to rein in spending.

"It's a bit of a gamble, let's face it," he said. "But I'm not in this job to do nothing." Harte added: "We will be judged in the end, and, hopefully, people will look back and say 'Wow, that was a bold move that worked.' "

Voters in Glendale, filled mostly with renters and transients, did have a say - at least the few who showed up. They approved the sale of up to $20 million in bonds to build a separate events center at Infinity Park and to purchase some property. Voters also approved a hotel tax of 6.5 percent to pay off the debt. The events center is expected to open in November.

The bond vote was 143 to 46.

Not everyone was initially thrilled about the financing. The hotels in Glendale, with a lower tax, had enjoyed an advantage over Denver. The move would hike the total hotel tax in Glendale to 14.6 percent, nearly in line with Denver's 14.85 percent rate.

"We actually have a very good relationship with the city, but we were concerned about the huge increase," said Ellen Seymore, general manager of Loews Denver Hotel. "You never want to increase it that much in one year."

City officials eased her concerns, outlining the potential business impact. The hotel management also came to realize that Infinity Park and the event center "will open an international market that was untapped for us," Seymore said.

Jonathan Bryant, manager of the Holiday Inn Select just beyond the city's boundary, said the plan to shift the focus abroad is "well-calculated."

Although it is too early to judge Infinity Park as an economic stimulus, "the economic impact, at least so far, is not what was anticipated," he said. "They don't have the momentum yet. Hopefully, they will in the future."

Dunafon and his allies have not faced much heat from the local press. Bonniwell's Glendale Cherry Creek Chronicle has run upbeat stories about Infinity Park, including one under the headline: "Visionary Sports Center is as Grand as Glendale."

Bonniwell also sits on the Glendale Chamber of Commerce's board along with Matthews and serves as the lawyer for the city planning commission.

Donafon, a Golden native also has found himself in the middle of plenty of conflict. His partner in a limousine company was sent to prison, although Dunafon was never charged with a crime. Before joining the council, he ran Commonwealth Telecommunications, which filed for bankruptcy. Dunafon said the outfit collapsed because a company he was doing business with was fraudulent.

The return of the 'raptors'

Dunafon is a University of Northern Colorado alum, who admitted using steroids briefly as a young man when he was trying to make the Denver Broncos team. But he expressed disappointment with most sports and the messages they send. Rugby offers children better role models, he said.

Dunafon signed with the Broncos twice in the late 1970s but failed to gain a roster spot. His NFL dreams dashed, he said he set sail for the Virgin Islands with several companions. Living in Tortola, in the British Virgin Islands, he fell for rugby.

Years later, Matthews' son, Tyler, who Dunafon helped raise, chose to play the sport and traveled overseas.

"I saw a transformation, what happens to kids when you introduce them to the world," Dunafon said. "It was incredible."

Dunafon's mind raced, and he began to bounce ideas off Matthews and Bonniwell.

"We said, 'What are we going to do now? We need an identity,' " Dunafon said. "So the raptors sat down and said our identity should be rugby. Now how do we do it?"

The three already had a reputation in town. Dunafon, who makes $12,000 a year on the council, has made friends and enemies in Glendale.

In the late 1990s, they formed a group dubbed the Glendale Tea Party and went after Mayor Joe Rice, who sought to make Glendale more family friendly. The city raised the age limit for strippers to 21 from 18 and imposed a 6-foot buffer zone between dancers and patrons. The Tea Party suspected the plan was designed to drive Shotgun Willie's out of business so the land would become available to developers, Dunafon said.

The "raptors" label was inspired by Jurassic Park, Dunafon explained with a smile. "We had to fight" like raptors to take back the city, he said.

In 1998, three council candidates backed by the raptors were voted into office, and the new slate repealed the strip club ordinance. Two years later Dunafon tried to no avail to become mayor. Rice was re-elected.

A decade later, the raptors found a new mission and got to work. Bonniwell studied the bond issues. Dunafon said he "went out and beat the drum" while others in Glendale joined the cause.

It was Rice, the mayor from 1996 to 2003 and now a state representative, who suggested in jest they call the rugby team the Raptors, Dunafon said. They took the advice and put a three-headed raptor on the logo.

Out with Geoffrey Old

Geoffrey Old, once a member of the rugby powerhouse the New Zealand All Blacks, was recruited to coach the Glendale Raptors in a coup for the city.

The Kiwi was asked by Dunafon several years ago to serve as president of a rugby clothing company called Kudu and was receiving $2,000 a month, according to a lawsuit he filed in Denver District Court. Old said he had secured a work visa through Glendale allowing him to stay in the United States and reached a deal with the city to assist with the team.

But Old, also the former coach of the Dutch national team, claimed Dunafon stopped paying him and that attorneys phoned to say Dunafon had decided not to renew his visa. Old said he's owed $25,000.

Mark Bullock, Glendale's rugby director who is now also coaching the team, said the Raptors "did not progress in a positive way" with Old at the helm, and the squad "was reduced to a just a handful of players."

The Raptors have moved on. The rugby matches so far have drawn between 1,500 and 4,600 people, said Gerry Freeman, a spokesman for the city.

Now that the first phase is complete, Glendale will shift to the next chapter, keeping audiences and sponsors happy and booking events. That's perhaps a tougher challenge considering the competition in the Denver area. Businesses seeking exposure and consumers looking for entertainment have a lot of options.

The project, Dunafon said, is not about ego or creating a club for a clique of rugby fanatics as skeptics might believe. Dunafon said he gets these ideas and runs with them.

"I just get excited about something if it seems fun and meaningful," he said.

patonj@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-2544

• June 21, 2008

  4:31 a.m.

  Suggest removal

  vfl12 writes:

  The statement that I was dismissed "for alleged threats (I) made against a councilman" is so patently absurd it is laughable. Get your facts straight before you disparage a person's reputation by blindly forwarding specious comments from sources you know are biased and questionable.
  Veggo Larsen