What are the odds?

• Author: Spaid, Ora
• Position: Commercial development at Patoka Lake to boost tourism at Orange County - Focus: Regional Report South

What Are the Odds?

Casino gambling may not have gotten legislative approval to build the tourism-revenue pot in Orange County, but there's some high-stakes gaming going on there, anyway.

The action involves commercial development of Tillery Hill, an 1,800-acre peninsula at Patoka Lake, which straddles Orange, Crawford and DuBois counties. A group called Patoka Partners proposes to lay down $75 million to construct a 200-room hotel, cabins, an amphitheater, two golf courses, two beaches, a 300-slip marina, fishing piers, a theme park and a wild-animal park. Backing the developers with moral support, if not money, are many of the tourist operators, business owners, chambers of commerce and jobless workers in the six counties surrounding the lake.

Right now, the odds would seem to be against the project, if comments received by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers regarding its draft environmental impact statement are of any handicapping validity. Assimilating the "very, very large response" from public hearings and written comments - 60 percent against and 40 percent in favor-may delay issuance of the final impact statement report due this month.

The corps created the 8,800-acre reservoir - second largest in Indiana next to Lake Monroe - for flood control, recreation and natural resources management. The corps leases the 26,000-acre site, which opened in 1980, to the Indiana Department of Natural Resources.

Some 750,000 people visited Patoka Lake last year, drawn to the state's largest campground, marinas, cabins, boat ramps, beaches, visitors center, bike paths, hiking trails, archery range, model airplane field, exercise trail, even a Frisbee golf course. The lake is stocked with bass, bluegill, red ear, crappie, northern pike and tiger muskies. The 17,000 acres surrounding the lake abound with habitat for wildlife - deer, coyote, fox, squirrel, quail, grouse, dove, osprey, loon, swan, crane and bald eagle.

When the corps delivers its final impact statement report, it will allow at least 30 days for challenges to its data or findings, which will be considered but not answered. Then a recommendation will be made, essentially a choice among three alternatives:

* The plan for extensive commercial development of Tillery Hill;

* A scaled-down version contained in the corps' original master plan calling for a lodge, cabins, one golf course and a small marina at Tillery Hill; or

* Leaving Tillery Hill undeveloped.

That last alternative is what the...