Des Moines Register
12-10-06
Resort renews hope in Rathbun Lake area
The Honey Creek project could be a boon to a region that has seen tough times.
By PERRY BEEMAN
REGISTER STAFF WRITER
Moravia, Ia. - When President Nixon traveled to this section of southern Iowa in
1971 to dedicate Rathbun Lake, older residents of the area had already watched
coal-mining jobs blow away like so much dust.
They saw railroad jobs roll out of the region, too. Iowa Southern Utilities Co.
closed its corporate headquarters in nearby Centerville a few years after Nixon
was here, taking more jobs with it. And this year, Rubbermaid, a gun
manufacturer and a shrink-wrap operation, all in Centerville, said they were
leaving, too, wiping out a combined 600 jobs.
That drip, drip, drip of negative economic news through the years explains why
residents of the Rathbun region - one of the less economically gifted areas of
Iowa - greeted the groundbreaking in October at the new Honey Creek Resort
State Park with such giddy enthusiasm. It explains why the event was such a
community celebration in places like Moravia, Albia, Centerville, Chariton and
Corydon.
"It's not very often we get a $40 million to $50 million capital injection in our
area," said Albia banker Kevin Kness.
Resort represents hope for area's future
Honey Creek Resort is more than just a vacation destination that will open in a
year and a half, providing first-rate lodging and outdoor recreation in a
spectacularly beautiful setting. The resort represents a vote of confidence for the
area and its future.
The four counties that surround Rathbun Lake - Appanoose, Lucas, Monroe and
Wayne counties - hope the resort leads to an economic boom for the area that is
bigger than the resort park itself.
Kness hopes the resort lures people to a section of the state that often feels
overlooked by the rest of Iowa. Area residents are hoping those visitors will
spend time, and their money, in the area. But residents also are eager to show
off one of the state's prettiest areas to people from across Iowa and around the
Midwest.
"It has given people hope," said Barbara Robinson, a Moravia native, referring to
the resort project. "When people see something getting built, there is hope that
we aren't dying off."
Developers hesitated to build near Rathbun
The Iowa Department of Natural Resources and community leaders in the
Rathbun area pushed for construction of a resort after Nixon's visit 35 years ago.
But officials could not get developers interested in taking a chance on the
Rathbun region.
In recent years, however, the state decided to take that chance itself. And for
good reason.
Perhaps nowhere else in Iowa is there so much water holding so many fish and
so many recreational possibilities, yet with so little development and so few
visitors.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers built Rathbun by putting a huge dam across
the Chariton River, which winds through a stunningly picturesque corner of
southern Iowa and northern Missouri that is big on rolling hills, tall grasses,
pheasants, deer and trees, but low on people - and jobs.
Community leaders in the area nicknamed Rathbun "Iowa's Ocean." At 11,000
acres, the lake is twice as large as Saylorville Lake, another federal reservoir
located north of Des Moines. Yet Saylorville is Iowa's most-visited lake, and
Rathbun ranks ninth, an Iowa State University study found.
Resort may boost business activity
Residents of Appanoose County and the surrounding area hope the construction
and Memorial Day 2008 opening of the 850-acre Honey Creek Resort ushers in a
new era of business activity to make up for the past losses in mining, railroading
and manufacturing.
The development will have a lodge, restaurant, cabins, golf course, and an
indoor aquatic center - along with a giant boating playground a few hundred
yards away. The complex will include a conference center that officials hope will
lure business retreats to the shores of Rathbun Lake.
There are signs that development is already perking up in the area around
Rathbun, with homes, restaurants and convenience stores popping up even
before the earthmovers and construction workers get down to business building
the resort. Land is for sale all over the area, and it is commanding higher prices.
One of those promising signs of what leaders hope is the future of the lake area
is being provided by Barbara Robinson and her husband, Edward.
The Robinsons are behind one of the larger new private developments in the
area. This month they open what may be Iowa's only motel-restaurant-fitness
center-wrestling school-grocery store rolled into one site along Iowa Highway 5 at
the edge of Moravia.
The Honey Creek Resort project played into the Robinsons' decision to create
their own jobs, Barbara Robinson said. The state resort promises more traffic, as
does new housing planned at Sundown Lake, a quiet spot east of Moravia, and
in the Iconium settlement west of Moravia, Robinson said.
The Robinsons' own farmhouse is a symbol of the area's empty past and the
need for renewal. The house is situated amid cornfields that cover land once
occupied by Old Foster, a coal-mining town that had 2,500 residents before it
eventually disappeared.
"There is no sign of that town ever being here," she said.
End of coal mining left area struggling
It's a similar story throughout the Rathbun area.
At one time, there were 300 coal mines in Appanoose County alone, with 100 in
operation at any one time, said Bill Heusinkveld, a local historian.
The industry peaked in 1916, employing 4,175 people in 94 Appanoose County
mines that took 1.7 million tons of the fuel out of the ground that year.
After 1920, coal-mining faded, although mining remained active on a tiny scale
into the 1950s.
The arrival of natural gas and a shift to cleaner, lower-sulfur coal, combined with
the arrival of trucking, sent Iowa's coal jobs packing.
However, many mining families stayed, including immigrants from Italy and
Croatia. The immigrants' family names still dot the local phone directories.
"Coal mining was a huge industry in Appanoose County," Heusinkveld said. "It
changed the whole complexion of the area. In the 1880s, they sprouted all over
the area" - mostly in underground mines where workers dug out veins of coal a
bit more than 3 feet thick.
Locals raise money for $48 million deal
Today, with mining just a distant memory, the area around Rathbun struggles to
offer a consistent, varied collection of jobs.
That's why Honey Creek, expected to employ 70 people in the off-season and
200 in the summer, is such a big deal. That doesn't count the undetermined
number of construction jobs and the spin-off developments that community
leaders are counting on.
"Psychologically, it's a real positive," said Kness, the Albia bank president who
leads Rathbun Lake Resort Inc., the local group that has pushed for the state
resort project.
"Rathbun is one of our shining stars," he said. "There have been a lot of
disastrous things that happened down here. We aren't a very prosperous area
economically."
But people in the Rathbun area have already raised $3 million of their $4 million
share for the resort project. The whole resort is a $48 million deal.
Resort needs to lure visitors from afar
Economics Research Associates, a Chicago consulting company, analyzed the
financial forecasts for the resort project. The company expects Honey Creek to
pull visitors from a 270-mile radius that has 2 million people and includes
Chicago, the Twin Cities and Kansas City.
The resort's main market is considered a 130-mile radius. The close-in market,
within 50 miles, has 225,000 people.
Vacationers and business retreat guests from Des Moines, 90 minutes away, are
expected to be solid.
The census bears out the necessity for the resort to lure visitors from afar.
Since 2000, while Iowa's overall population gained 1.4 percent, three of the four
Rathbun-area counties lost 1 percent or more of their population. The only gainer
was Lucas County, which experienced a 2.7 percent population gain.
Retail sales show another aspect of the challenge community leaders are
wrestling with. Per-capita retail sales in the region lag the statewide level by
approximately 25 percent.
Towns work together to tout new plan
Iowa historian Tom Morain, now the outreach director at Graceland College in
Lamoni, said the Rathbun resort project is vitally important to southern Iowa.
Land in the area is harder to farm, and that has depressed land values.
Now, with the resort being the talk of southern Iowa, land prices are perking up,
and investors have bought land for game farms and acreages.
The Rathbun project has renewed Morain's faith in Iowans. He is impressed by
the way Rathbun area residents have set aside their rivalries and joined in a
multi-county sales pitch to win legislative approval for the resort.
"For so long, our biggest enemy has been the town eight miles down the road."
Morain said. "We think our community extends to the end of the school-district
boundary. Our biggest enemy is not the town eight miles down the road. We
have to think regionally."
He added: "When a state-sponsored project like this comes in, the advantage
southern Iowa has is it is a scenic area not adequately tapped or discovered.
There will be people who want to live near that lakeshore."
He predicted that the park will bring new housing, as have Sun Valley Lake in
Ringgold County and Lake Panorama in Guthrie County.
Local expects hope, enthusiasm to build
Carol Bradley, a retired educator, grew up near Centerville and returned to the
area a couple of years ago after a long stay in the Des Moines area.
"The lake is a hugely under-utilized asset," Bradley said. "It is an absolutely
wonderful, beautiful lake and surrounding area.
"If you live here all your life, you maybe don't realize that. If we get people to
come and visit, they comment, 'I had no idea what was here.' The area has been
working on tourism for quite some time. The resort park picks up that effort
tremendously.
"My own belief is that next spring the hope and enthusiasm will improve
dramatically," Bradley added.
That's because construction of the resort park will begin in earnest, and
construction workers will help push the economy.
"With the resort, there will be good jobs for young people, including part-time jobs
for high school kids," Bradley said.
Jobs would increase population diversity
Those jobs are important in a four-county area that wants to attract new residents
to a place where one-fifth of the population is over age 65.
"There is a sense of vibrancy that such a facility creates in the area," Bradley
said. "These are jobs the area really needs."
"I know it will bring big economic activity to the region," she added. "It's a
beautiful area. When people come to visit, some will choose to move here. I
know that."
Jeff Vonk, director of the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, which planned
the resort project, said the development is an experiment to see if the state can
take advantage of under-used natural attractions.
"They are beginning to capitalize on the economic development appeal of the
natural resources," Vonk said. "This will be an economic boon in a part of our
state that is looking at closures and moving in another direction. I think there is a
realization that clean water in lakes is an economic asset that can be built on."
"We need a shot in the arm"
The Rathbun area is one of the poorest, least-populated sections of Iowa.
Before crews converted Iowa Highway 5 to four lanes southeast of Des Moines,
this area was a regular stop for hunters, fishing enthusiasts and eagle-watchers but few others. Now, it's about a 90-minute drive from Des Moines to Rathbun.
Most of Rathbun Lake is in Appanoose County. In 2003, per-person retail
spending in the county was 40 percent under the statewide average. The number
of retail firms in Appanoose County dropped from 511 to 1998 to 422 in 2003.
Cindy and Jim Burnside have lived in the area since before the Rathbun dam
was built 35 years ago. They were there, decades ago, when talk of a resort
complex began, grew, then failed.
The Burnsides run Buck Creek Cabins, but they do not consider Honey Creek
lodge competition. They are thrilled the area is getting something fresh and new.
"This is a wonderful event for southern Iowa," Cindy Burnside said. "We need a
shot in the arm. So many times we thought it would happen and it didn't."
What happens next is a topic of cafe chatter - and hope.
Reporter Perry Beeman can be reached at (515) 284-8538 or
pbeeman@dmreg.com