Downtown Hotel to be Hampton Inn
By Steve Vied, Messenger-Inquirer
Published: Tuesday, January 12, 2010 12:21 AM CST
Highly-placed sources told the Messenger-Inquirer on Monday that The Malcolm Bryant Corp. has been selected by a special committee to build an upscale Hampton Inn hotel in downtown Owensboro.
Malcolm Bryant, the president of the Owensboro-based real estate development and property management company that counts the Owensboro Hampton Inn among its many holdings, wouldn't confirm that his company is the developer selected by the committee to build and operate a hotel in downtown Owensboro.
In an e-mail reply last week to a question asking if The Malcolm Bryant Corp. had been selected to build the hotel, President Malcolm Bryant answered, "I think that it would be the best of respect to everyone to let EDC (Economic Development Corp.) make any comments or decisions on this."
Bryant, who was out of town last week, did not return a call Monday seeking comment.
The name of the developer will probably be revealed officially Thursday, Mayor Ron Payne said Monday.
Payne wouldn't say if he planned to make the announcement during his scheduled "State of the City" address Thursday morning at the Rooster Booster meeting at Owensboro Christian Church.
"We'll probably announce it Thursday, let's just leave it at that," Payne said.
Nick Brake, president of the Greater Owensboro Economic Development Corp. and a member of the committee charged with recommending a developer to build and operate the hotel, said the official announcement would come this week, "probably Thursday or Friday."
Last week, Brake said the committee had narrowed the field to one developer but that some work still remained before the deal could be finalized. A month ago the committee was still negotiating with two developers, both of which had local connections and had relationships with national hotel brands. In late October, the committee announced that three finalists were in the running, and all had proposed building a hotel with between 150 and 175 rooms.
The Owensboro City Commission meets for a work session at noon today and on the agenda is a closed session to discuss acquisition of property and a specific proposal.
Payne said the session relates to the hotel project. Brake would only confirm that he would attend the closed session.
The hotel, to be accompanied by an adjacent convention center, is proposed for the site the state office building occupies on Second Street between Frederica and St. Elizabeth streets. In December, Payne confirmed that the City Commission had reached consensus to buy the building from the state for $1.74 million.
Bryant's name has come up often in connection with downtown Owensboro development news. Last year Daviess Fiscal Court purchased 3.7 acres of property in front of the Executive Inn Rivermont as the future site for the planned downtown convention center. Fiscal Court paid $2.227 million to River City Rentals LLC for five parcels of property. Daviess County Judge-Executive Reid Haire said at the time that Bryant was a principal of River City Rentals and had agreed to sell the property for what he had in it.
In mid-2008, Bryant was one of the developers who was considering investing in the Executive Inn Rivermont property before losing interest in the project. At the time, Bryant said he had talked with city and county officials about working with them if they were successful in buying the hotel property. Last year the city bought the property for $5 million.
The Malcolm Bryant Corp.'s local holdings include The Springs Health Centre, Chase Bank Building, Corporate Centre, Midtown Building, National City Bank Building, Healing America Building, Courtyard Office Park, 1001 Frederica Street and the Hampton Inn. Bryant owns a Hampton Inn on I-265 East in Louisville.
Multistory Hampton Inn & Suites hotels can be found in many metropolitan downtowns, including Atlanta, Memphis, Tenn., Nashville, Chicago, New Orleans and New York. Greenville, S.C., which attracted a delegation of 26 members of the Greater Owensboro Chamber of Commerce for a visit last year seeking downtown development ideas, has a new 115-room Hampton Inn & Suites. Bryant was a member of that delegation.
Steve Vied, 691-7297, svied@messenger-inquirer.com
