MONTICELLO — Mohegan Sun at the Concord gained its requested $36 million in tax abatements this week, thanks to a unanimous Sullivan County Industrial Development Agency (IDA) Board meeting on Wednesday.

That followed a public hearing Monday evening, where Bryan Cappelli, COO of the Cappelli Organization and son of developer Louis Cappelli, pitched the Kiamesha Lake casino resort as a modern successor to the Concord Hotel, which once occupied the same spot and which his father had unsuccessfully tried to resurrect in years past.

“We're preserving the Catskills' history with a modern touch,” he explained in a presentation that echoed his father's famous “swatches” speech to the county more than a decade before.

Most of the public comments, like the presentation itself, were reiterations of past remarks supportive of the abatements as a necessary part of Mohegan Sun's/Cappelli's financing.

A few interesting items were revealed:

• In addition to steel and concrete in storage and available to be used in construction (thanks to the aborted effort to rebuild the Concord itself), Cappelli said the resort's glass curtain wall “is literally ready to be delivered and installed tomorrow”

• Over $100 million has already been spent on the old Concord's demolition and stalled reconstruction

• If a casino license is granted to Mohegan Sun, a million-dollar loan might be made to nearby Holiday Mountain Ski Area for a zipline and other attractions targeted at casino guests

“That will create the spark,” affirmed Holiday Mountain owner Craig Passante during the comment period. “We can [then] create that wildfire.”

Sullivan First Recycling and Refuse owner Shirley Felder was even more direct.

“We should be thinking about quality of life ... about hopes and dreams,” she urged. “Kids can't be hospitable here when there is no hope. ... I would beg you to give them the opportunity to dream again.”

Of the dozen speakers, only Ken Walter of Grahamsville was lukewarm toward the prospect of abatements.

“I hate it when things are predetermined and then you have a public hearing,” he criticized, noting that the cost-benefit analysis for Mohegan Sun - a critical document listing the estimated costs vs. economic benefits of giving the casino a reduced tax burden - was only posted to the IDA's website the day before the hearing.

What Mohegan Sun is getting

The deal granted to Mohegan Sun at the Concord Wednesday is an update of a pre-existing one that came about when Louis Cappelli was independently planning to rebuild and reopen the Concord.

Board members Ira Steingart, Ed Sykes, Suzanne Loughlin, Charlie Barbuti, Steve White, Howard Siegel and Carol Roig gave their assent, while members Sandy Shaddock and Sean Rieber were absent.

It would shave nearly $6 million off state and county sales taxes, $3 million off mortgage taxes, and $27 million off property taxes, spanning a nearly 20-year period.

The current assessed value of the 140-acre property is just over $10.4 million, upon which Cappelli is paying around $372,000 a year in county, town and school taxes.

The IDA agreement calls for a PILOT (Payments In Lieu Of Taxes) for 16 years based on a mutually-agreed-upon assessment of $47.25 million (less if an Orange County casino is built, which would result in a smaller project by Mohegan Sun).

Assuming a casino license is granted and Mohegan Sun/Cappelli build on the larger scale envisioned, the first year's PILOT would total $1.45 million. While that's less than what it would pay if fully taxable, the property would generate revenue to local taxing jurisdictions nearly four times higher than what it currently generates.

The cost-benefit analysis estimates that overall benefits would outweigh costs by more than $1 billion over the two decades of gradually-declining abatements.

The complete analysis can be found at www.sullivanida.com (click on “Current Projects,” then “IDA Project Documents”).

Adelaar next

While a conceptual abatements agreement is in place for the separate but adjacent Adelaar project, the IDA Board is meeting on September 3 at 12:30 p.m. at the Government Center in Monticello to cement it.

In exchange for up to $15 million in sales tax abatements and a varying level of property tax breaks depending on the size of the project (which itself is dependent on whether one of Adelaar's potential competitors also gets a license), Adelaar will make annual PILOTs starting around $1.5 million for the next 16 years, gradually decreasing as the resort pays more and more of the full tax rate.

The abatements only apply to the first phase of the project, which includes the casino.