Bass Pro gets green light in Atlantic City

Springfield-based Bass Pro Shops received a final green light last week for a store in Atlantic City, N.J., that comes with $12.3 million in construction financing through a state agency.

Bass Pro’s more than 70,000-square-foot store would anchor the fourth phase of The Walk outdoor shopping center co-developed by Cordish Co. and Tanger Outlets. The public financing by the Casino Reinvestment Development Authority represents two-thirds of the $18 million tab to build the store on four acres at the foot of the Atlantic City Expressway, what Bass Pro founder Johnny Morris calls the entrance to the city and some 33 million tourists annually.

“After touring the site, it was apparent that we were being offered the most high-profile location in the Atlantic City market,” Morris said in a news release. “The vast majority of all 33 million visitors to the city will pass directly by our new store.”

Bass Pro officials first reached an agreement in Atlantic City in August 2012 and set a spring 2013 groundbreaking. New Jersey’s CRDA board, which directs casino funds into public and private projects, approved a low-interest, long-term loan with Cordish Co. in September 2012.

“We have been working on this agreement for quite some time,” CRDA Communications Director Kim Butler told Springfield Business Journal yesterday. “The final contracts have been signed. We’re now looking forward to a third-quarter groundbreaking.”

Citing the agreement, Butler said Bass Pro Shops expects to hire 150–200 people at its Atlantic City location.

Earlier this month, Bass Pro officials announced plans to serve as anchor of another New Jersey development. The $2 billion, 450-acre Luxury Point in Sayreville, N.J., is positioned 30 miles southwest of Manhattan.

Among plans for 21 new stores across the United States and Canada, Bass Pro is scheduled to open a 200,000-square-foot store at Luxury Point in 2015.