A large complex with bowling lanes, bocce ball courts, a bar and an arcade could be on its way to DeVargas Center if the Alcohol and Gaming Division issues a final approval for the transfer of a liquor license to the new business' owners.
The entertainment center, which would do business as The Alley, is co-owned by husband and wife Joseph and Hannah Padilla. The couple also owns Santa Fe Tails, a dog day care center off St. Michael's Drive. The Padillas incorporated the new business, The Alley Santa Fe Properties, LLC, last November.
Ellen Dickens, a property management administrator at DeVargas Center, tells SFR that the Padillas' plans to occupy the space have not been finalized, and that there is still a chance they will decide to move their business elsewhere. She declined to comment further.
"There will be a press release [next week], and we're very close," Dickens says. "So rather than tell you anything that's halfway there or 99 percent there, I'm going to hold off saying anything specific because we're that close to having things finalized."
If the bowling alley is sited at DeVargas Center, it will encompass nearly 18,000 square feet, and will be located in suites A & B at 153 Paseo de Peralta, currently occupied by Office Depot, Travelers Market and Longevity Strength Training and Fitness, according to the application.
The state's Alcohol and Gaming Division granted preliminary approval for the liquor license transfer on Feb. 14. The couple is attempting to purchase a license previously held by D&A's Pub, Inc., which lists its premises in Maxwell, Colfax County, and use it at the new business.
The next step for the couples' acquisition of the license is for the city to send a recommendation for approval or denial to the Alcohol and Gaming Division after a public hearing at the April 11 City Council meeting.
Reached by phone, Joseph Padilla directed questions to the couples' public relations representative, Andrea Multari of the company Whole Brain Design.
"We want to make that information available to the public, [and] it's an opportunity for the public to learn about this new business and give their input," Multari tells SFR of the public hearing in April.
Both Multari and Dickens requested SFR not publish details about The Alley until next week, when Multari says she will issue a press release about it. Dickens would also not confirm whether any businesses would be displaced as a result of The Alley.
But Joseph Arellano, the owner of the gym Longevity Strength Training and Fitness located at DeVargas Center, says that property manager Katie Fitzgerald informed him last December that a new tenant was interested in his space and that he would have to leave once his lease ended.
"She said they're looking for long term tenant, [and] I told them, the gym has been here for 27 years already," says Arellano, who bought Carl and Sandra's Gym and opened Longevity two years ago. "We're not happy with the way we were treated overall [by DeVargas property management]."
Arellano says that even if the plans to locate The Alley at DeVargas Center fall through at the last minute, he is still planning to move his gym elsewhere. At the moment, Arellano says, he is looking at a space in the Plaza Entrada area, near the Rail Runner Zia Station and I-25.
An employee for Traveler's Market tells SFR she could not confirm whether their business was planning to relocate. Reached by phone, an employee of Office Depot referred SFR to DeVargas Center property management.
Santa Fe has been without a bowling alley since Silva Lanes closed in 2008. A group of business partners later built an arcade-style bowling alley and bar in the Market Station building in the Railyard, but it never opened and they've since filed for bankruptcy.
