Will Shaq Be Building Apartments in Atlantic City?

Shaq photo by Keith Allison, used under a Creative Commons license; Revel and photo illustration by Dan McQuade

Shaquille O’Neal wants to come to Atlantic City. He’ll find out sometime in the next few months whether he can actually do it.

Shaq isn’t blacklisted from the island casino resort city. He can surely get a line of credit at any casino. But he and developer Wasseem Boraie want to build The Beach at South Inlet, a $61 million apartment complex near the shuttered Revel casino. Today, the Casino Redevelopment Authority is expected to extend a loan expiration date in order to give itself more time to evaluate the proposal.

As The Press of Atlantic City wrote early Tuesday, the RDA first approved the $30 million loan to Boraie and Shaq in March 2013. Then Revel and Showboat closed, and Trump Taj Mahal began teetering on the brink. The RDA decided to reevaluate the proposal for apartments in the South Inlet, a neglected, half-vacant portion of the north end of the city.

The Beach at South Inlet rendering via Boraie Development

The loan expires at the end of the month; the RDA should extend that deadline at today’s meeting.

Meanwhile, Boraie says he’s ready to go. “Our Team has secured outside financing for the Beach at South Inlet Project from the New Jersey Housing and Mortgage Finance Agency and are eager to begin,” he said in a statement. “We look forward to working closely with the Casino Reinvestment Development Authority (CRDA) to make this happen in a timely manner.”

The new deadline for the loan expiration is January 29th. RDA officials will have to make a decision on the project before then.