The town has two main roads: Borrego Springs Road and Palm Canyon Drive, which intersect at Christmas Circle. The nearest stoplight is 50 miles away. Its small business community is primarily tourism-based, although there is some agriculture, primarily citrus.

Everything in the town revolves around Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, the second-largest state park in the United States and a big draw for campers, off-roaders and day-trippers. With this winter’s heavy rains, the spring wildflower bloom is expected to be spectacular and bring in much-needed tourism dollars. Perlman’s vision for what Montesoro and the other properties could become gave hope to the town’s small business community, which has always struggled, especially recently.

“Imagine being a small-business owner in Borrego and you heard this big businessperson was going to potentially pump millions of dollars into the community. It would get your hopes up. It got everyone’s hopes up,” said longtime resident Mark Jorgensen. “And then it didn’t happen. Of course you would be deflated.”

Gwen Marie, until recently the president of the local Chamber of Commerce, said, “The market, Montesoro, Casa del Zorro, that’s a lot to leave, which is what they’ve done.”

Perlman said townspeople should be thanking him, not criticizing him. He said he has improved the properties since buying them, and added that the investors in the companies that own the properties are pushing for him to find new owners.

The community’s first hint that things were headed sideways came in May 2007 when a bulldozer one day scraped out a 1.8-mile long road near Montesoro that traversed park land and several pieces of private property.

“When the guys graded the road into the park, that was the first big negative stroke against them,” said Jorgensen, who until last year was the superintendent of Anza-Borrego Desert State Park.

“It was symbolic of their attitude toward the community. It was kind of a brash, condescending attitude that developed over the last couple of years. It was an insensitive action, and it showed me personally as the superintendent of the park in my dealings with the ownership and the management that they weren’t really willing to take responsibility for their actions.”

Perlman said in an interview last year that the construction of the road was a simple mistake caused by improper flagging. The state sued, and settlement negotiations are ongoing.

Jorgensen said the mood of the community is that Perlman has abandoned Borrego Springs and doesn’t care about its residents.

Gregory, the golf course superintendent, said that is definitely what people think, but it’s not deserved.

“I wouldn’t characterize it that way. He’s someone that had Borrego’s best interest in mind but maybe didn’t execute the plan at the right economic time. A lot of people want to point fingers at Greg. But there’s a lot of highly reputable developers out there who have left private members at clubs all over the country in real bad shape. He has not left (Montesoro members) high and dry. He’s kept the golf course open.”

Perlman said La Casa del Zorro had been losing $500,000 a month for years under the previous ownership. Perlman said that had he not bought the property, the resort was going to have to close within a few months.

Even after remodeling and lowering rates, Perlman said the resort was still losing $250,000 a month, and he had no choice but to close it. But he believes that given the right investors, a market for a high-end inn in Borrego still exists.

The future of Montesoro is more questionable, he said. “It’s still up in the air” whether Borrego can become a viable second-home community given the remoteness of the area, he said.

As for the grocery store, which Perlman called “filthy,” he said he wishes he had never bought the place, but even closed “it’s nicer than when it was open.” Perlman’s company stopped making payments on the store’s loan debt in early 2009. It has reverted to its original owner.

“It was a grand dream and a grand vision,” Marie said about all of the plans. “Had it worked, it really might have done something big for this community. There is utter disappointment that things didn’t work out.”