The operators of Honey Creek Resort are asking Polk County District Court to extend their March 12 deadline to reopen the state-owned facility after a state-forced shutdown.
Achieva Enterprises LLC gained a temporary injunction at the end of 2025 allowing it to resume operation of the resort. But in court documents filed Monday, Feb. 16, it alleges the Iowa Department of Administrative Services, which took over the resort in an October dispute, allowed the property to deteriorate while it sat empty over the winter months and has yet to provide full access to the facility.
The department in a sharply worded response Tuesday said it “categorically denies the false allegations advanced by Achieva. These continued misrepresentations demonstrate that Achieva’s priority is attacking the State instead of reopening Honey Creek Resort.”
“These continued misrepresentations demonstrate that Achieva’s priority is attacking the State instead of reopening Honey Creek Resort. Notably, Achieva has not claimed it has taken any affirmative steps to reopen the Resort in any of its recent filings,” it said. “Instead, it has failed to respond to emergency water leaks and heat loss issues at the property despite having possession and control of the premises.”
Achieva is calling on the court to order the state to pay for repairs needed before reopening the resort, which features a 106-room lodge, 28 cabins, an indoor waterpark, an 18-hole championship golf course and a marina on the shores of Rathbun Lake in southern Iowa.
Achieva won the contract to operate the resort in 2023. It filed a lawsuit seeking the injunction after the department abruptly terminated the contract on Oct. 29, 2025, following a contentious phone conference with the company’s owners, Beth and Terry Henderson, the previous week.
The meeting centered on a disagreement between Achieva and department officials regarding the facility’s deteriorating water park. The department wanted to repair it while the Hendersons favored replacing it with an indoor miniature golf course.
Department officials contended they had to take over the resort after the Hendersons in the meeting threatened to close it. The couple have since said the threat was an expression of frustration in the heat of the moment rather than an actual plan.
The department also maintained the Henderson had failed to insure the resort and carry out other contractual obligations.
But on Dec. 26, Polk County District Court Judge Jeffrey Farrell sided with the Hendersons, ruling that the department had acted without sufficient justification to close the resort. He granted the temporary injunction restoring Achieva as the operator of the resort, with a mandate that Honey Creek be reopened no later than March 12.
In the court documents, Achieva alleges there were delays in the state providing keys to the facility, and that even now, the company lacks full access.
It also claims that, while in control of the resort, the state “committed many separate contemptuous acts” of negligence and misuse of the facilities. That includes an accusation by Achieva Director of Operations Beverly Peterson that Department of Administrative Services Director Mark Campbell stayed in the resort’s Presidential Suite while the facility was closed.
Additional documents indicate the kitchen, other portions of the resort and its equipment were used during the shutdown for “recreational purposes.”
Achieva also says that department failed to provide routine maintenance and sanitation, maintain utility service and winterize golf carts, bicycles, a John Deere Gator, outdoor furniture and games.
Achieva additionally alleges the department violated the management contract by making changes and undertaking maintenance projects without notice to or coordination with the company. Its filing includes photographs of what it says are neglected equipment and facilities, as well as an image of boxes and bags of Achieva property piled haphazardly in the resort’s ballroom.
It accuses the state of “repeated willful decisions to treat this Court’s orders as optional.”
“Rather than comply, the State delayed access, ignored mandatory maintenance and winterization obligations, misused the Resort for unauthorized purposes, and continued to act as though the Court’s injunctions do not apply to it,” Achieva’s filings say. “Achieva now returns to this Court seeking enforcement, because court orders mean little if a party, particularly the State itself, can disregard them with impunity.”
State says director stayed at resort to complete inventory operators failed to do
The department in its response acknowledged Campbell stayed in the Presidential Suite and used the kitchen. But it said his stay was in connection with a four-day inventory project to “necessitated by Achieva’s failure to conduct an annual property inventory.”
During that stay, it said, Campbell prepared pancakes in the kitchen for department staff, and mistakenly left some butter and syrup in the refrigerator.
It said that contrary to Achieva’s claims, the state “has worked to repair the Resort and prepare for the 2026 season. The State finished a roofing project, replaced aged water shutoff valves, and winterized the Resort and golf course,” adding, “The State has documented its efforts to care for the Resort as it now waits for Achieva to show up and reopen, as it told the Court it would.”
“Achieva now claims it cannot reopen the Resort within the time it previously represented to the Court,” it said. “But the pictures it has submitted to support this claim show trivial issues like cardboard boxes in a kitchen, two water bottles on a table, or ceiling tiles temporarily removed to fix a heating issue that Achieva failed to address.
“This accords with Achieva’s apparent strategy for this case: maximum disruption for the Resort and minimal care for taxpayer dollars,” the department said. “Notably, Achieva’s counsel represented to the Court that taxpayer dollars reserved for repairs of State property were accounted for and being held in a separate bank account. But Achieva has failed to respond to the State’s request to identify this account and confirm the amounts held there.”
It also attacked Beth Henderson’s credibility, saying she had testified in court that she never said Achieva “was ‘resigning, ceasing operations, or otherwise shutting down its business.’ But when confronted with a recording of a conversation in which she told the State Achieva would ‘lock the doors’, ‘cancel reservations’, and ‘send everybody home’ because Achieva was ‘closing ‘er down’, Mrs. Henderson reversed course, telling the Court… she didn’t mean what she had said.”
“The State remains committed to transparency, accountability, and the reopening of Honey Creek in a manner that protects public interests and ensures lawful stewardship of public funds,” it said.
Dispute latest chapter in troubled history of Honey Creek Resort
In addition to seeking an extension for reopening, Achieva is asking the court to require the state to restore the resort to its original condition as well as ensure the company has full, unimpeded access to all of the facilities.
“This relief does not excuse performance; it restores fairness by aligning Achieva’s obligations with the realities caused by the State’s noncompliance and misconduct,” the company’s petition says.
Envisioned as the result of a drive for state resort parks then-Gov. Tom Vilsack launched in 2000, the $60 million Honey Creek Resort was funded in large part by tax-exempt state bonds. But the project never became the premier Iowa vacation spot envisioned by state leaders and the Legislature spent another $33 million to pay off the outstanding bonds before turning Honey Creek’s management over to Delaware North Cos. in June 2016.
Under its contract, Delaware North was supposed to pay the state a portion of its profits after Honey Creek’s annual revenues hit $7 million. With the resort’s debt paid off, the Iowa Department of Natural Resources projected the deal could be worth millions to the state.
But Honey Creek’s revenues and occupancy never achieved that level, information from the agency showed, and plunged after the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020. Delaware North opted out of its contract in 2022, and the Hendersons and Achieva took over the following year.
(This story has been edited to add new information.)
Kevin Baskins covers jobs and the economy for the Des Moines Register. Reach him at kbaskins@registermedia.com.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Honey Creek operator, state clash over accusations about resort
Reporting by Kevin Baskins, Des Moines Register / Des Moines Register
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