PORT ANGELES — The proposed Marriott hotel and conference center project on the waterfront might be dead, but future conference center proposals that include either a tax subsidy or hotel will face more legal hurdles.
That’s the vow of Best Western Olympic Lodge owner Tod McClaskey Jr., who fought Randal Jay Ehm’s project that would have received $2 million in city lodging tax subsidies for 20 years.
Ehm, a San Diego architect, withdrew the project Monday, citing lack of private financial support and unwillingness of city officials to explore a broadened public-private partnership to build the hotel/conference center.
“What I’m very opposed to is someone being subsidized by the city to compete against us,” McClaskey told Peninsula Daily News on Tuesday.
“We will fight against that. It’s not right for us, and it’s not right for the other hotels.”
One of the others who sued to stop Ehm’s project, Ed Tuttle, told the city’s Lodging Tax Advisory Committee on Monday that any future hotel project would be the subject of a lawsuit.
Didn’t believe price figure
McClaskey said he knew Ehm couldn’t build his proposed conference center and hotel for the originally stated $14 million.
Ehm’s latest estimate of $29 million was more realistic, he said.
Had it been built, the new waterfront hotel could have taken all the business from his Best Western Olympic Lodge, 140 DelGuzzi Drive, and the waterfront Red Lion Hotel, 221 N. Lincoln St., and still wouldn’t have been able to pay the debt service, McClaskey said.
“If the city is going to try subsidizing someone, then we will try to fight it,” he said.
“If someone wants to spend $30 million of their own, we’ll let them do that.”
