CARIBOU - Officials of the Northern Maine Development Commission and the Aroostook Partnership for Progress will be leaving for Las Vegas on Sunday to attend a weeklong conference where they will attempt to entice investors to build a resort in Aroostook County.

Earlier this week, the president of Global Resorts International reported to the NMDC and the Partnership for Progress that a resort is feasible for Aroostook County. John Sweeney, after a 10-month feasibility study, told County officials a resort is feasible.

Part of the study also involved a 75-room hotel-motel concept in Fort Kent to support biathlon, snowmobiling and summer tourism in that part of Aroostook County.

Sweeney proposed a concept he called a hub, spoke and rim resort that would involve all of The County.

"It looks promising," Robert Clark, executive director of the NMDC, said Friday. "We don't have a final report back yet, but John Sweeney said the proposal is an eight on a scale of one to 10.

"They have determined that a resort is very feasible in Aroostook County," Clark said. "It would probably be a resort with a central lodge, with activities from southern Aroostook County to the St. John Valley tied into it."

The central lodge would have facilities such as a lodge, spa and restaurant. Spokes of the plan could include such activities as hiking, biking, snowmobiling and fishing, which could take place anywhere in Aroostook County.

The rim segment of the plan is for other facilities in The County to support tourism activities such as outings in the Allagash River. That would probably include wilderness cabins where tourists could stay.

Clark said a lot of research and market focus group work went into the study. The company talked with people in New York, Boston and Portland to find out what would bring them to Aroostook County.

The next step in the $350,000 plan is the Las Vegas trip where four meetings have been set up with developers and investors. Some 5,000 investors and developers attend the annual meeting of the American Resort Development Association each year.

"We hope to present the plan to investors, and hopefully spur interest for them to come and look at the area," Clark said. "It will probably take a couple months for the next step to be done.

"We should know if this will be fruitful in three months," Clark said.

The study by Sweeney's group cost $200,000. It was funded with $50,000 each from the NMDC and the APP and $100,000 from the USDA Rural Development Program through Maine's Department of Economic and Community Development.

The next $150,000 expenditure is already funded, but Clark said they are looking to other monetary sources for assistance. The expenditure is primarily funded through the Aroostook County Empowerment Zone.

Clark said Sweeney told the group that the 75-room facility for Fort Kent "could be easily sustained."

They are looking for a national chain franchise to work with a group of local investors for the facility.

Clark said Fort Kent has to build on its biathlon and other tourism traffic for the motel-hotel complex to work.

"They [Sweeney's group] feel it can work," Clark said.