The Bismarck Park Board and NISHU Bowmen club are preparing to open a new indoor archery range that has been in the works for 10 years.

NISHU Bowmen President Steve Arnold told Bismarck Park District Board members on Thursday night that they plan on dedicating the building July 25. Arnold said he hopes to have the facility open to the public by sometime in August.

Built on the site of an existing outdoor archery range at Fox Island, the project got under way last summer. It cost about $500,000, with the Park District footing about half the bill, said Park District Director Steve Neu.

Neu said the Park District owns the new building and was responsible for installing infrastructure such as parking lots and outdoor lighting. The NISHU Bowmen will lease the facility from the Park District and will be responsible for administering the programs.

Arnold said the facility will give the club much more room than the space it currently uses in the World War Memorial Building downtown. He said the club first began to dream up the idea in 1998, and began soliciting donations and investing in bank CDs in 2001 to pay for it.

"It shows that, in partnering with the park district, we were able to accomplish something that we would not have been able to on our own," Arnold said.

One aspect of the partnership concerned board member Mike O'Brien at Thursday night's meeting. O'Brien said he worried that the arrangement gave the park district too little control over the costs and fees associated with offerings such as public archery shooting or youth classes.

He said he wanted "safeguards" to ensure that "it doesn't become too expensive for the public to shoot down there."

Arnold said it would be counter to the club's interest to charge fees that discourage access. Park Board President Paul Quist said the district could opt out of the agreement if it felt these concerns were not adequately being addressed.

Trail project delayed

A walking and biking trail project from South Washington Street to Cottonwood Park will be delayed.

The delay comes after the Park District Board decided Thursday to "re-engineer" the project after bids on it came in around $55,000 higher than expected.

"That's just too far over estimate," Neu said.

Neu said the district would be looking changing the project to try to get it more in line. Ideas include using concrete instead of asphalt to pave the trail and changing the irrigation system to try to bring its cost down.

(Reach reporter Jonathan Rivoli at 250-8264 or jonathan.rivoli@bismarcktribune.com.)