Before dueling convention centers became a thing in Jonesboro, they were a thing in Texarkana. And it’s not turning out well in Texarkana.
Perhaps you remember our reporting in 2012 on plans by officials in Texarkana, Arkansas, to proceed with a convention center despite the opening on Oct. 5, 2012, of the $24 million, 25,000-SF Texarkana Convention Center on the Texas side of the city. Those plans were spearheaded by one Harold Boldt, who was then the Texarkana, Arkansas, city manager. Boldt searched and finally found a local investor to develop a convention center on the Arkansas side: Dr. Hiren Patel, a doctor of internal medicine living on the Texas side of the city.
Patel, with a lot of incentives from Texarkana, Arkansas, finally got the $18 million convention center on the Arkansas side of the city up and running in August 2013, though the incentives prompted a look from the Arkansas Division of Legislative Audit.
Well, big, big problems for Patel and the Arkansas Convention Center have arisen in recent months. Here’s a rundown of the latest developments:
• Midsouth Bank of Lafayette, Louisiana, filed a foreclosure petition in Miller County Circuit Court in October against Patel, Nila Patel, the doctor’s wife, and Patel’s Texarkana Hotels LLC, an Arkansas company. The bank says the Patels have defaulted on more than $10 million in loans used to build the Arkansas Convention Center and is seeking the center’s sale to satisfy the debt.
Miller County Circuit Judge Brent Haltom has scheduled a hearing in the case for April 4.
• In November, Midsouth sued the Patels for $2.8 million, alleging they defaulted on a loan for a hotel they own in Texarkana, Texas, the Country Inn & Suites hotel.
• On Nov. 3, Patel’s company Krishna Associates LLC of Texarkana, Texas, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Texas. Krishna Associates owns Country Inn & Suites. That filing came right before a foreclosure sale of the hotel, according to the Texarkana Gazette.
The Chapter 11 filing halted the sale.
Krishna Associates went on to report no income for 2015, $5.3 million in debts and $3.2 million in assets. The latest operating report, filed on Tuesday, showed the hotel losing $74,172 in February.
• On March 17, Bowie County, Texas, Circuit Judge Leon Pesek Jr. issued a summary judgment against the Patels because they had personally guaranteed the loan, finding they owed Midsouth more than $2.8 million on the hotel loan.
Regarding That Audit …
As for Harold Boldt, the city manager? Well, you may remember that the city fired Boldt in March 2013 and then turned around and rehired him in September 2013.
In February 2014, the Division of Legislative Audit released its report regarding Texarkana’s dealings with Patel. It found numerous apparent violations of state law and the report was forwarded to the local prosecuting attorney.
Boldt went on to serve Texarkana until resigning in June 2015.
In October 2015, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported that the Arkansas State Police had investigated Boldt and found what it thought were three misdemeanor actions.
But Carlton Jones, a then-prosecuting attorney for Miller County, declined to prosecute because Boldt had left office, and Pulaski County Prosecutor Larry Jegley, to whom a perjury charge was referred, said he didn’t believe Boldt had committed perjury, the newspaper reported.