Warrenton Group offers peek at proposal: Developments in south Petersburg, Pocahontas Island

Bill Atkinson, Petersburg Progress-Index

PETERSBURG – On the eve of Sunday's casino town hall, one of the five developers bidding on Petersburg’s business says it has formed a partnership with not just a gaming vendor but also one of Virginia’s Native American tribes – and is even claiming endorsement from Virginia State University as a "collaborative partner" of the city.

Saturday's announcement from The Warrenton Group also says the “Gateways2Petersburg” initiative actually covers two developments. One of them will be at the south end of the city where the casino is expected to go, and the other on Pocahontas Island that Warrenton predicts will boost that end of town and VSU just across the Appomattox River in Ettrick.

"We're setting the stage for an era of unparalleled growth and revitalization in Petersburg,” Warren Williams Jr., Warrenton’s president, and chief executive officer, said in a statement accompanying the announcement.

Warrenton is a Washington, D.C.-based corporate developer making its first foray into the gambling industry. The firm said it has joined forces with the Delaware North entertainment group and the Upper Mattaponi Tribe on the two-pronged project.

The announcement comes days after one of the other bidders, The Cordish Companies, said it was bringing on NFL Hall of Famer Bruce Smith as a co-developer for a 90-acre mixed-use community off Wagner Road.

Warrenton also has some sports-celebrity backing. Former University of Virginia and NBA basketball star Ralph Sampson, a member of basketball’s Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame, said in a statement that he was backing Warrenton because “Petersburg is a special place for me.” Sampson’s mother attended VSU.

Sampson, a Harrisonburg native who played for four NBA teams over a 12-year career, owns The Sampson Group, an advisory group for the hospitality, sports, media and business communities.

Joining Warrenton and Cordish for Sunday’s meeting are Bally’s Corporation, Penn National Gaming and Rush Street Gaming. The other groups have not previewed their presentations.

What is Warrenton proposing?

Warrenton calls its plan “Gateways2Petersburg” because it proposes major development on the north and south ends of town. The southern development will be anchored by the casino and a hotel, while the northern development calls for a hotel, housing for VSU students, and a mix of retail and hospitality business.

The Southern Gateway off South Crater and Wagner roads includes:

  • a160,000-square-foot casino with 1,600 slots, 55 table games and a sportsbook;

  • numerous restaurants, including a high-end steakhouse, a sports bar and grill, and a food hall;

  • a 200-room hotel tower to include spa and pool decks, and spaces for meetings and conferences; and

  • 200 housing units onsite for casino and hotel employees.

In the statement, Delaware North said it would build a temporary casino to be open while its permanent home is being built. Once the main development is finished, the group plans to add an entertainment venue and a hotel with 100-150 rooms.

Delaware North gaming group president Brian Hansberry said in the statement that he envisioned the Petersburg development to resemble its property in West Memphis, Arkansas.

Brian Hansberry, group president of Delaware North’s gaming business, said: “This project is very similar to our Southland Casino Hotel in West Memphis, Arkansas, which is helping revitalize a city that is similar to Petersburg,” said. “We’ve created hundreds of jobs there while providing millions of dollars to local and state governments and vital charitable and educational organizations.” In addition to Southland, Delaware North has developed and operates a portfolio of mostly owned casinos in the U.S. and Australia.

The Northern Gateway, to be located on the old Roper Brothers Lumber property, is referred to as the Pocahontas Island Revitalization Project. It includes:

  • a 100 to 150-room hotel;

  • 120,000 square feet of retail space;

  • a food hall and a restaurant that would resemble a sailing vessel to go on the riverfront;

  • housing for VSU students and community athletic facilities; and

  • walking trails and a health hub.

“The Northern Gateway plan would enhance the residential portions and waterfront of Pocahontas Island without changing its true nature, preserving historical landmarks while honoring the deep history of the country’s first free Black community in a proposed museum,” Warrenton’s announcement read.

Pocahontas Island, a nationally recognized historic area, is one of the oldest free-Black communities in the U.S. Although called an island, it actually is located on a peninsula that juts into the Appomattox River.

Endorsements from VSU, Upper Mattaponi

In the announcement, Warrenton said it sought out the involvement of the Upper Mattaponi Tribe, which it called “an original steward of the Virginia Tidewater Region and now a force for economic development and community engagement.”

“We engaged with The Warrenton Group and Delaware North in this proposal because it provides us an extraordinary opportunity to work with the City of Petersburg on an economic development project that will support high-quality education, expanded healthcare services, good jobs and the ability of our citizens to provide for their families close to home,” tribe chief Frank Adams wrote in a letter to Petersburg Mayor Sam Parham and quoted in the announcement.

It also quoted a letter from VSU president Makola Abdullah to Petersburg City Council endorsing Warrenton.

“As a university based in the community and a stakeholder, the revitalization of Petersburg is paramount to our programs, our student population, the city of Petersburg and the surrounding area,” Abdullah’s letter read. “As your collaborative partner, we are asking you to give The Warrenton Group’s proposal your utmost consideration.”

Smith: Petersburg 'long forgotten'

In an interview last week with The Progress-Index, Smith outlined what he will bring to the town hall on behalf of him and Cordish.

Smith, owner of Bruce Smith Enterprises and a pro football Hall of Famer from Norfolk, said the plan he and co-developer Cordish Companies have is for “a resort destination location” that Petersburg asked for when the city made its request for proposals [RFP] last month. He did not divulge too much about the proposal, but he did confirm that the group plans to build a temporary casino on the chosen site while its permanent home is under construction.

Once the full-time location is online, he said, the temporary casino will be converted into a 3,000-seat entertainment venue that will be attached to the permanent gaming parlor.

“We would build the temporary casino so that the city and state can make money from Day One,” Smith said.

Smith has worked with Cordish on other developments. He said he signed on to the proposal after he and his fellow NFL Hall of Famers visited Petersburg High School last October. He said he saw firsthand the effects of what he called “a city long forgotten” by others.

“Talking to the students, meeting city officials, seeing the extremely high unemployment, no major vocational education center ... seeing all of those issues existed made me want to do something to help,” Smith said.

Cordish and Petersburg are no strangers to one another. Last year, the company announced plans to build a $1.4 billion casino-centric development off Wagner Road that were contingent on Petersburg successfully lobbying the Virginia General Assembly to approve the referendum. When that did not happen, Cordish stepped away.

Instead, central Virginia’s casino attention shifted back to Richmond, where it had been prior to the city’s voters narrowly rejecting a 2021 referendum. Richmond pushed for and got a do-over for the referendum, but voters turned that down last November by a wide margin.

After that, Petersburg resubmitted a request to be Virginia’s fifth casino-host city. With new representation in the state Senate, the third time was Petersburg’s charm, and the referendum now seems fast-tracked to a November 2024 vote.

“No pun intended, we want to tackle the issues within the city of Petersburg,” Smith, who played defensive tackle for the Buffalo Bills and Washington Redskins-turned-Commanders, said.

He added that he sees his proposal as a business community "that happens to have a casino in it."

The next steps

  • The two-hour town hall meeting, hosted by state Sen. Lashrecse Aird, D-Petersburg, will kick off at 2 p.m. in the multi-purpose room of the Petersburg Public Library at the corner of West Washington and North Market streets. Each vendor will have 15 minutes to present their cases, then there will be about 45 minutes when attendees will get to quiz the bidders about their plans.

  • Three days after the town hall meeting, on April 17, the General Assembly will reconvene in Richmond to go over legislative vetoes and amendments from Gov. Glenn Youngkin on the more than 1,000 bills sent to him this session. One of those amendments involves Aird’s casino referendum legislation. The governor has asked for – and Aird has endorsed – removal of House of Delegates-placed language that would have required a second Assembly vote.

  • Later this spring or early summer, City Council is expected to vote on the winning bid for the casino development. Shortly after that, we are likely to begin seeing major pushes from both proponents and opponents leading up to the November referendum.

  • If you cannot make it to the town hall, there are plans for it to be livestreamed through the city of Petersburg's website. It also will be simulcast on The Progress-Index's website.

Bill Atkinson (he/him/his) is an award-winning journalist who covers breaking news, government and politics. Reach him at batkinson@progress-index.com or on X (formerly known as Twitter) at @BAtkinson_PI.

This article originally appeared on The Progress-Index: One Petersburg casino bidder wants to expand development across town

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