Developer's big back-to-back deals took years

It's been a big couple of weeks for Rick Wrobleski.

Last week, the Reno-based developer and broker closed on the sale of 135 acres along the Truckee River east of Sparks to the Nature Conservancy and Bureau of Land Management.

And just a few days earlier, Wrobleski watched as the sale he brokered of the old Factory Outlet Mall and 82 adjacent acres in Sparks was closed, a major step toward development of tourist-oriented retail on the property.

Despite the back-to-back big action, land deals have been anything but a get-rich-quick plan for Wrobleski, the managing director of Reno-based Developers Realty.

Both the Nature Conservancy purchase and the sale of the Sparks property by Robert Blume of Capital Development to RED Development of Kansas City, Mo., were more than five years in the making.

The Sparks sale, for instance, hinged on approval by the Nevada Legislature of so-called "STAR bonds," which use a big chunk of the new sales tax generated by a retail development to pay off public infrastructure the development requires.

The deal had its genesis, Wrobleski recalled last week, in a visit he made in 2002 to a RED Development project in suburban Kansas City.

During that visit, he learned that RED as well as Cabela's sporting goods would make availability of STAR bond a prerequisite for northern Nevada developments.

At the time, Cabela's had just opened a store next to a RED project in Kansas. It hadn't yet announced its plans for a northern Nevada store near Boomtown at the west edge of Reno.

Working with Sparks Councilman Ron Schmitt, attorney Steve Polikalas and Washoe County officials, Wrobleski played a role in winning legislative approval of STAR bond legislation in 2003.

But even with the legislation, Sparks officials needed to commission a study of the likely economic impact of RED Development's plans. State tourism officials needed to give their blessings before the deal could close. School officials, too, needed to be consulted.

And all that was just for the piece of the property sale that dealt with STAR bonds.

At about the same time that he began working with RED Development on its plans for Sparks, Wrobleski was approached by executives of the BLM and the Nature Conservancy, who were interested in Developers Realty's plans for its land along the river east of Sparks.

Wrobleski and a group of investors are developing plans for the 1,800-acre 102 Ranch that includes the river frontage, and they saw the sale to the Nature Conservancy and BLM as a way to develop an amenity and some goodwill for their plans.

"Not only is it a very important piece of Washoe County's flood-control program, it will also become open space for hiking, biking, rafting, fishing and kayaking for all to enjoy forever," Wrobleski said last week. "Everyone can benefit so long as everyone thinks with a win-win attitude."

Even so, the transaction took five years of talks and the involvement of arcane government groups such as the Sierra Front-Northwestern Great Basin Resource Advisory Council and the Truckee River Flood Management agency.

Complicated deals such as the RED Development transaction and the Nature Conservancy purchase are nothing new to Wrobleski, who came to northern Nevada in 1987 after working as a broker in Southern California and as land acquisition consultant for Bren Co. of Newport Beach.

He sold the south-Reno land that's home to the new Bishop Manogue High School, a complex transaction that brought in the University of Nevada, Reno, to buy the high school's old location.

And working with his longtime companion, Joan Bedell, Wrobleski developed the public safety training center and emergency operations center on land near Parr Boulevard and Highway 395.