VAI Spends $455,000 on Ballot Measure Fight Near Phoenix

A special election for Arizona’s largest hotel project outside Phoenix has cost VAI Resort nearly $500,000 in campaign expenses to fight two labor-backed ballot measures.

Voters in the city of Glendale have until May 20 to mark their ballots for the zoning propositions that could delay the $1.2 billion hotel, concert arena and theme park at 9601 Cardinals Way, across from the Arizona Cardinals stadium, the Phoenix Business Journal reported.

VAI Spends $455,000 on Ballot Measure Fight Near Phoenix — A rendering of VAI Resort at 9601 Cardinals Way in Glendale (VAI Resort)

The ballot measures were launched by Worker Power, a Phoenix-based labor group citing concerns about transparency and “problematic” project approvals, including land sales, discounted leases, zoning changes and proposed tax breaks.

VAI Resort, led by Grant Fisher of locally based Fisher Industries, has paid more than $455,000 to Nexus Strategy Group to convince voters to support the zoning measures it says are critical to the project.

The payment includes services such as door knocking, mailed flyers, yard signs, text messaging and video production.

At the same time, Worker Power has spent nearly $41,800, the bulk going to printing services and digital ads. It also gave $93,000 for canvassing and advertising to the ballot initiative committee “Parks Not Parking Lots.”

The special election is expected to cost the city of Glendale $250,000.

VAI Resort, located in Glendale’s sports and entertainment district, has been in the works since 2020. Since then, it’s faced numerous delays, along with a change in ownership, multiple legal battles and a dispute with the Arizona Cardinals.

The 60-acre, 660,000-square-foot development includes four hotel towers with 1,100 rooms, an outdoor concert arena, Mattel Adventure Park, convention center, a dozen restaurants, shops, a 5-acre white sand “swimming oasis” and a party island.

If both measures fail, VAI resort developers will have to either rework their plans or face further delays fighting to get the zoning approvals they need to complete the project.

“This is a big election over a relatively small piece of land, but it’s essential to the overall project,” Garrick Taylor, a spokesperson for the Yes for Glendale campaign, bankrolled by VAI Resort, told the Business Journal.

Last year, Worker Power put another ballot measure related to the VAI resort before voters to raise the minimum wage for hotel workers in Glendale to $20 an hour, which failed.

The institute, however, had successfully campaigned against a proposed Arizona Coyotes arena in a referendum in Tempe, where voters rejected the development agreement and the attached incentives, ending the plan between the hockey team and the city.

— Dana Bartholomew