The recent sale of Wendover industrial park land to RDC National is just the latest development in what could be a second major economic boom in Wendover in the next few years.
Indeed with a major gold mine in the Pequops being developed and another some 50 miles south ready to expand, the future for Wendover has never looked brighter. On the other hand even as rays of economic sunshine can be clearly seen on the horizon many old timers would be forgiven if it is called a mirage.
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For over two decades developer after developer has come to the Utah/Nevada border town promising prosperity only to withdraw with at best half finished buildings and a trail of bad debt.
The difference this time around is the new industries promised are not reliant on the disposal wealth tourists bring into Wendover, but the real gold in them thar hills waiting to be dug out of the ground.
Wendover’s first boom began in the mid 1970’s when the price of a gallon of gasoline increased by over 200 percent in just five years. Until then the border town had just one casino and was a just a wide spot on the newly completed interstate.
Just 120 miles from Salt Lake Wendover was in the perfect position to offer gambling and cheap liquor to Utahans whose own state outlawed game of chance.
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Wendover boomed. In less than ten years four new casinos joined the venerable StateLine on the strip and the city’s population tripled. In 1991 the border town grew to two with the incorporation of West Wendover, Nevada. A shopping mall was built as well as housing projects and apartments and a golf course.
For residents and tourists alike the transformation was almost breathtaking and eleven years ago that West Wendover earned the title of Nevada’s fastest growing city by more than doubling its population from over 2,000 when the city incorporated in 1991 to well over 4,000 in 2001.
In addition to an almost exponential increase in single family homes West Wendover saw three new apartment complexes and three new mobile homes parks built in less than ten years.
Small retailers also flourished.
But at its peak in 2001 the boom began to bust. Facing financial disaster the StateLine Casino Corporation began to pare down its work force and unknown to many of its employees began to cut payments to the company’s health insurer.
The crisis reach its peak in 2002 when the company declared bankruptcy and was later sold at auction. Hundreds of jobs were lost and even workers who retained employment found their life savings wiped out by medical bills they thought they were insured for but were not.
But while the StateLine bankruptcy can explain the beginning of the bust the stagnation that followed cannot be put on the shoulders of a company that has not existed for eight years.
Instead Wendover’s economic stagnation is probably due to a combination of factors some within and some outside of the city’s control.
Small retailers and home based business owners have frequently complained about West Wendover’s over regulation of private enterprise that borders to the point of harassment.
From the color of paint to a building to exactly what merchandize a store may sell often becomes an item on the city council’s agenda.
Wendover’s only major industry was hit and hit hard by the Great Recession that began in 2007. Large expansions were put on indefinite hold and the casino workforce was trimmed and trimmed again.
With less money in their pockets, casino workers made fewer purchases and small business suffered.
In the past five years West Wendover has seen a number of relatively large retailers leave town such as Park Furniture, Bargain Barn Serendipity and Blanchard’s Furniture. Two years ago it saw the closure of one of its two full service banks, Nevada Bank and Trust.
The dearth of private enterprise is most acute in the retail industry which apart from Smith’s Food Store is virtually nonexistent in West Wendover.
Purchases as simple as a computer printer ink, a telephone or even a coffee maker available literally in a half a dozen locations in communities of similar or even smaller sizes as Wendover, often necessitate a 240 mile round trip to Salt Lake City to the east or Elko to the west.
West Wendover’s population shrank by largest rate and was just one of three Nevada cities to show a drop in population in the 2010 census. According to the census there 4,410 people in Wendover in 2010, a drop of 6.6 percent from the 4,721 counted in 2000 and more importantly a drop of more than 10 percent from its estimated population of a bout 5,000 from the state demographers office.
West Wendover’s population decline has also spilled across the border into Wendover, Utah. The much smaller sister city also reported a decline of about 10 percent.
Yet even as the census was painting a rather bleak picture for Wendover, good news or a rumor of good news was also reported.
In the Pequop Mountains less than 30 miles west of the border town gold was found and in a little more than three years the gold rush may come to Wendover according to officials from Newmont Mining.
In addition to being having ‘smoking hot’ ore the area is a stones throw from Interstate 80, has no endangered species living anywhere near it and does not have any significant archeological sites located on it.
Like the geologists the recent past, ancient Native Americans also apparently ignored Long Canyon.
Ignored no longer, the mine has the potential to radically alter the economy and the lives of eastern Nevada, residents of Wendover and Wells. The two cities who once looked with jealously at the boom in Elko and Carlin could soon have a mine to call their own.
Estimated to need 500 workers during construction and 250 miners once operations are ready, the Long Canyon mine could add at least 1,000 people to the area and that may be just the tip of a gold boom in eastern Elko County.
The same people who found a mountain of gold where no one else expected to find one in the Pequops range 30 miles east of Wendover are now looking for more of the yellow stuff just to Wendover’s south.
Animas Resources Ltd. Announced that it has signed a letter of intent to sell its interest in the Kinsley Mountain gold project in Nevada to Pilot Gold Inc.
Pilot Gold is led by the same management and technical teams that built Fronteer Gold, a strong growth company acquired by Newmont Mining Corporation for approximately $2.3 billion. In 10 years, Fronteer Gold grew from a $2-million venture shell into a well-funded, high profile, development-focused gold company. During this time, Fronteer Gold discovered or advanced seven deposits.
In addition to Long Canyon and Kinsley Mountain, other exploration in the area is also heating up including the old Victoria Mine near Currie.
Even as the promise of new industry brightens the horizon, Wendover’s old staple gaming appears to be on the mend and possibly growing. According to the state gaming control board Wendover clubs reported for only the second time in five years two straight months of gaming win increases.
