News broke last week that the Bellevue, Nebraska city council had unanimously approved a $60 million dollar bond for financing a waterpark. Not just a standard, run-of-the-mill waterpark, but a 100,000 square foot, world-class, regional waterpark. There is a lot of excitement behind this announcement, but also a lot of questions. We sat down with Bellevue Mayor Rusty Hike to get more information about some of the questions floating around town.
Bellevue Times: “I’ll believe it when I see it” has been heard a bit in relation to this project. This sentiment comes from decades of other proposed ‘Big Ideas’ coming to our town that never came to be. Although nothing is 100% positive, how sure of a thing is this?
Mayor Hike: It’s 99% for sure. The council approved the bond and construction of the waterpark is funded. I don’t know what could happen to stop it now. We have good working relationships with the waterpark management team down in Texas and a good working relationship with the land owner. He owns 70 acres on the northwest corner of Highway 75 and Highway 34. We would need 30 acres for this project and we have some verbal agreements in place.