Today, the council will make one of the most significant decisions in its recent history - whether or not to support a convention centre at the Lakeview site, near the Queenstown CBD.
Late yesterday, Remarkables Park Ltd (RPL) co-director Alastair Porter issued a statement, announcing plans to construct a convention centre on fully zoned land at the Frankton site.
The Otago Daily Times understands Mr Porter emailed councillors at 5.20pm, inviting them to a morning briefing on his proposal, ahead of the extraordinary full council meeting at 1pm.
Both Ms van Uden and chief executive Adam Feeley have said the announcement will not affect this afternoon's meeting.
Mr Porter told the ODT ''we've got the money''.
But in the statement he said the Remarkables Park Conference Centre was ''based on private equity funding'' although RPL ''remained open to joint venture capital injections from other private equity, central government and/or local government sources'' which would enable a higher specification facility.
The announcement came as news to Ms van Uden and to Mr Feeley, who said it was ''curious and interesting timing''.
''There are people who are going to pick up the paper [today] ... and think why are we going to spend ratepayer money when Father Christmas is presenting us with a convention centre?''Well, I've got news for them - Father Christmas doesn't exist,'' Mr Feeley said.
The council's proposal has been on the drawing board for two years and subject to various meetings and hearings, as well as a request for proposals - during which RPL made a submission which involved a centre in Frankton.
Ms van Uden said a panel of independent experts declined the company's proposal because it was in the ''wrong location'', it required ''primarily public funding'' and the council was concerned it would ''undermine the economic growth of the CBD in Queenstown''.
Mr Porter said at the time of the briefing in February, RPL would forge ahead with its own facility.
''And just in case that message hasn't got through to the councillors, we're making that point again.''
However, Ms van Uden said in the seven months since the briefing Mr Porter had ''not mentioned once'' to her or the council he had an alternative proposal.
''This community has just gone through a four-week consultation process and at no point has he taken the courtesy to let them know there was an alternative proposal.''
Despite today's meeting being well publicised in the media over the past month, Mr Porter claimed to have only learned of it ''late last week''.
However, the council first issued its public advice of the do-or-die meeting on August 21.
It was initially set down for September 10.
Porter Group Ltd - the developer of Remarkables Park and Shotover Park - filed a written submission on August 31 and it made no mention of RPL's plans.
The public submissions hearing was held on September 3 - at which Mr Porter spoke - and the Mountain Scene reported two days later the meeting had been postponed until today. Mr Porter said he had tried to make an ''urgent appointment'' with Mr Feeley, but Mr Feeley could not see him until next week.
He said he did not divulge in his messages what he wanted to discuss with Mr Feeley.
Yesterday's announcement was because the company did not want to be ''criticised for not keeping councillors informed''.
He also thought it ''appropriate'' to divulge the plans before the council made a decision.
When asked about the funding, Mr Porter said ''we've got the money''.
Mr Feeley said if that were true, it would be a ''remarkable achievement'' and one which no other convention centre in Australia or New Zealand had achieved.
Traditionally, convention centres received public funding because they could not deliver a return on the capital required to build them.
''If Alastair's achieved the hitherto unachievable, then why not have the discussion - our door is always open.
''If he does have a genuine proposal, then I can't speak for councillors - they might seriously consider it - but that would be quite different to firing out a media statement at the 11th hour.
''That smacks to me of a grandstanding.''
Ms van Uden said if Mr Porter had the funding and was ''good to go, show us''.
''Until he's shown us, why should we put what this community has spent two years getting to this point on on hold?
''I don't think we'd ever be silly enough to walk down that path. I don't suffer from having an ego that big.''
• The council has previously named SkyCity Entertainment Group as the preferred operator of the proposed Queenstown convention centre, but today the council will not make that final decision. - Additional reporting: Ryan Keen, Mountain Scene
Conference centre
• Located immediately east of the Remarkables Park Town Centre on a fully zoned site and could be granted non-notified consent.
• Construction could begin next year on the centre, which would cater to 650 for dinner and almost 1000 for conference lecture sessions.
• It would include a large exhibition area, smaller break-out rooms and could be expanded to cater for future growth.
• It would not require a rates levy to underwrite operations and losses and would be based on private equity funding.
