Late last month, the Broomfield City Council voted to end the management and operations contract with the 1stBANK Center. The arena will close its doors on Nov. 30 and likely see a wrecking ball come spring. It is a swift and ignominious end to an event center that never lived up to its potential.

Since its opening in 2006 (when it was known as the Broomfield Event Center), the 6,500-seat arena has failed to pull its weight. Owned by the Broomfield Urban Renewal Authority, the center was designed to be a hub for revitalization, but, financially speaking, it never managed to be anything more than a burden for taxpayers.

The signs were there from the start.

“In a competitive market, booking concerts, filling seats and giving sponsors bang for their buck turned out to be tougher than anticipated. The story should give pause to communities and aspiring team owners plotting their own forays into the sports and entertainment realm, especially as the economy slows,” a Camera story from 2009 reads.

Also in 2009, a Westword headline asked, “How doomed is the Broomfield Event Center?”

It’s no surprise then that, according to Broomfield officials, the decision to shutter the facility has been a long time coming.

When it was originally approved as a part of the Wadsworth Interchange urban renewal area, plans called for between 180 and 190 events each year.

But the arena never even got close. At its peak, which was back in 2016, the 1stBANK Center managed just 33 events. For more than 330 days that year, the 1stBANK Center sat empty and unused.

This year, the picture is even more bleak: the center has been booked for just 10 events, with only three scheduled for the next six months. A publicly owned arena that costs some $1.2 million to operate annually is going to sit unused for more than 350 days and nights this year.

It is from this utter failure of management — the venue’s inability to compete with similarly sized arenas around the Front Range — that the 1stBANK Center spiraled beyond relevance and failed to become anything more than a financial burden.

And a burden it was.

Originally constructed in 2005 for $45 million and financed by nearly $60 million in municipal bonds set to expire in 2029, the current outstanding balance on the facility’s bond is $34.2 million in principal.

By the time BURA pays off the event center’s debts, it will have paid approximately $135 million.

Since the 1stBANK Center never made a profit, Broomfield was often forced into using money from other urban renewal areas to simply cover the debts of the arena. In 2020, the Wadsworth Interchange urban renewal area finally generated enough revenue to pay the facility’s debts. Thus the facility went from being a drain on all of Broomfield’s urban renewal areas, to simply being a drain on its own neighborhood.

On top of the financial shambles of the center are the safety concerns.

For one reason or another, the venue has seen a ridiculous number of emergency calls. Since 2016, there have been 738 medical calls to the arena. Considering the fact that there are only a few dozen events each year, that figure is especially astounding. According to the city, 73% of those calls came from EDM shows. And just one EDM event this year saw multiple drug-related arrests, eight indecent exposure citations and 79 medical responses.

According to Jennifer Hoffman, the Broomfield City and County manager, it was a steady culmination of these factors that led to the ultimate decision to recommend the management contract be ended.

Hoffman stressed that the decision was not made lightly and that the city and county recognize that demolishing a community staple is complicated and emotional. City leaders, she said, are mindful of that and determined to move forward with any potential redevelopments in an intentional and thoughtful manner.

If the City Council does decide to destroy the facility and redevelop the land, which has not been appraised, demolition will likely cost around $1 million, according to Hoffman.

The question that remains, though, is did it have to be this way? Was this failure simply a failure of management? Or was it that a 6,500-seat arena in Broomfield was never going to be able to compete with similar facilities in more populous regions of the metro area?

That was the thinking of Broomfield Councilmember Todd Cohen. “If you have ever been to Mission Ballroom or the refreshed Fillmore Auditorium, you will see what we are up against,” Cohen lamented.

(PEAK Entertainment, the management company of the 1stBANK Center, could not be reached for comment.)

Viewed from an analytical and purely financial standpoint, the 1stBANK Center was a failure from start to finish. A more holistic perspective, though, might revel in the good memories the venue provided over the years.

Still, the utter inability of the arena to even come close to the promised potential speaks to the need for Broomfield to approach the site’s redevelopment with caution.

Of course, it must be pointed out that the city and county’s current leaders are not those who approved this project nearly two decades ago. But a lack of culpability should not be seen as reason to ignore the lessons made plain by this debacle.

The process of deciding what comes next for this land should be done in partnership with the public. Broomfield residents deserve to feel that, while they may be losing one local amenity, they have a seat at the table in determining what comes next for their community.

It will be sad to see the 1stBANK Center close for good, but if the venue simply can’t compete and will continue languishing dark and empty for 350-plus days each year, it is time to find a more suitable use of that land.

Gary Garrison for the Editorial Board