University regents approve Whittell land swap

Jennifer Coleman

Thursday, July 29, 1999 | 2:20 a.m.

RENO, Nev., - A deal that hands the historic Thunderbird Lodge on Lake Tahoe's east shore to the University of Nevada, Reno was approved unanimously Thursday by university regents.

The 16,500-square-foot stone chateau will become a research center for environmental studies for UNR and will be open to the public for tours and conferences.

"This is really a service to the public, bringing this property into the public domain," said Ken Hunter Jr., UNR vice president of research.

Del Webb Communities Inc. wants to swap the estate, located south of Sand Harbor, in exchange for public land near Las Vegas that it wants to develop.

The deal now calls for a nonprofit corporation, the Thunderbird Lodge Preservation Society, to buy and operate the 147-acre property. The nonprofit will be a support organization for UNR, removing the university system from any financial liability.

The preservation society will sign a $9.8 million note due to Del Webb, and then try to raise funds to pay off the note over the next three years. But Del Webb representative Scott Higginson said his company isn't going to hold fast to a repayment plan.

If the debt isn't paid off in three years, "my chairman gets upset," Higginson said. "But there is no obligation on the university to make up the note."

Hunter estimated the deal would be finalized within a month.

The preservation society's initial directors include Hunter, Higginson, UNR president Joe Crowley Stephen Wells of the Desert Research Institute, and Graham Chisholm of the Nature Conservancy.

Phil Caterino would manage the society. As a representative of the American Land Conservancy, he helped broker the deal to let the U.S. Forest Service take possession of the estate - excluding the buildings - in a land exchange with Del Webb.

Caterino's salary will be in the neighborhood of $70,000 a year, Higginson said.

The university system would have unlimited access to the estate and could operate a field research station in the old lodge.

UNR scientists hope the research station will boost the campus to the forefront of environmental research activities at Tahoe.

The university also plans to hold conferences at the estate, built by flamboyant real estate tycoon George Whittell in the late 1930s. The estate was bought by New York mutual fund tycoon Jack Dreyfus in 1972 after Whittell's death.

UNR would have 30 days' free use of the estate's conference facilities each year. The system would have to pay rent for added time.

The conference center also could be used by outside groups, including corporations.

The university's plans also call for guided tours to showcase the property's historical, architectural, cultural and biophysical elements.

Dreyfus owned another estate in Zephyr Cove, south of the Thunderbird Lodge, that is the subject of a separate land exchange.

That deal, involving 46 acres and another lakeside mansion, underwent a probe by the U.S. Inspector General's Office and still is mired in controversy.