The proposal includes a 450-room hotel, a 20-acre indoor water park that would be used by guests and a conference center with meeting space for 2,000. The city is negotiating with Great Wolf Resorts.
Cumming Mayor Henry Ford Gravitt says the project would be a ``tremendous asset'' for the area. He says the resort would be designed to draw tourists from a 300-mile radius of Forsyth County.
Great Wolf has resorts in several cities, including Williamsburg, Virginia; Kansas City, Kansas; Niagara Falls, Ontario, and in the Pocono Mountains in Pennsylvania.
The water park and resort would be located at Mary Alice Park in Cumming, which sits on a peninsula on the Forsyth County side of Lake Lanier.
Gravitt says the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has agreed to give Great Wolf a 50-year-lease with the option of a 50-year extension.
The city of Cumming has pledged $10 million in improvements and incentives.
The state has committed to $1.6 million for road improvements. The county is being asked for $5.1 million as part of an incentives package. But, the county commission chairman - Charles Laughinghouse - says he's not quite ready to jump on the project bandwagon, saying that county officials were brought into the process late.
Cumming City Administrator Gerald Blackburn said Wednesday the company has set a November 1 deadline for commitments to the incentives package.
http://accesswdun.com/article/2007/8/86346