Deals secure council votes for city hotel

Council members Kenneth N. Harris Sr. and Helen L. Holton said in interviews yesterday that behind-the-scenes negotiations persuaded them to support the plan to build a Hilton hotel next to the Baltimore Convention Center. Their commitments will secure a 9-6 majority for preliminary passage Monday. Final votes will be taken next month.

“The administration is very excited about this,” said Deputy Mayor Jeanne D. Hitchcock. “It’s been a great team effort.”

More Top Picks Best White Noise Machines For Adhd Focus

A month ago, the mayor’s hotel plan had only three declared backers on the 15-member council. But administration concessions to council demands for community investments have now built what the administration and most council members believe is a solid nine-member majority of supporters.

Opposition members decried the deal-making and said risks associated with publicly financing the hotel’s $305 million cost outweighed the roughly $72 million being steered to neighborhoods.

Holton was able to get the administration to persuade Hilton to ensure that 75 percent to 85 percent of its hotel jobs would go to city residents. As part of that deal, Hilton committed to working with city agencies to provide jobs for ex-offenders and the unemployed, she said.

Holton said the administration also agreed yesterday to two projects in her Southwest Baltimore district: a gymnasium for the Edgewood Recreation Center, to cost at least $1 million, and a community action center in Edmondson Village.

In addition, Holton negotiated a tentative deal to create a grant program that would help senior citizens on fixed incomes pay to repair housing code violations.

“I’m supporting the project because of the jobs for the city,” Holton said.

Harris persuaded the administration to get Hilton officials to pledge $3 million in scholarships for city residents studying hotel management. The administration also agreed to place a $9 million bond question on the 2006 ballot to finance renovations to recreation centers across the city.

Other compromises had been made to secure votes, such as the $59 million affordable housing fund and the living wage guarantee for the union workers at the proposed 752-room Hilton hotel.

“The mayor and [Council] President [Sheila] Dixon appreciate the fact that Harris was wiling to work toward a solution,” Hitchcock said. “This process is moving forward.”

Under the plan being considered by the council, the city would create a corporation to develop, own and operate the hotel, to be built adjacent to the Convention Center just north of Oriole Park at Camden Yards. Baltimore would issue revenue bonds to finance the hotel.

If the hotel fails, the city would use tax income from the hotel – and possibly the occupancy tax from all Baltimore hotels – to pay off its debt.

The council’s committee of the whole agreed last week to place the hotel plan on Monday’s agenda by an 8-7 vote. Holton voted “yes” and Harris cast a “no” ballot. Holton said that her support was only a procedural move to free the package from committee and that she remained skeptical.

Harris has consistently said the city needs a convention center hotel but needed more private investment. He said that once he became convinced that no private capital was possible, he demanded that Hilton make an investment in the city.

“I’m willing to compromise,” he said. “I was a ‘no’ vote [Aug. 1] to show that I was serious business. I had some strict guidelines for my support.”

Hilton scholarships

Harris said he initially demanded a $10 million investment by Hilton but later acknowledged that that was asking too much. He said Hilton agreed Wednesday to provide $200,000 in annual scholarships for 15 years, to be doled out to city residents who are studying hospitality and hotel management at city colleges. How the money will be distributed is open to negotiations, Harris said.

Councilman Keiffer J. Mitchell Jr. was somewhat surprised by Harris’ change of heart. Mitchell said he knew Harris and Holton were holding out for a compromise.

He said they were wrong to support the hotel based on the compromises because the city was providing money for recreation center renovations, affordable housing programs, demolition of vacant housing, and job training and scholarship programs. None of the concessions, he said, outweighs the risk associated with publicly financing a $305 million hotel.

Politics vs. policy

Mitchell said his colleagues have “settled for crumbs.”

“Politics have prevailed over good policy,” he said. “The hotel issue is separate from neighborhood development. Neighborhood development should be happening in the first place, and I agree that it is happening.”

Councilwoman Mary Pat Clarke said the new concessions were not enough to convince her that the deal is good for Baltimore.

“Should we really be in the hotel business?” Clarke asked. She said that if the deal is defeated, private investors would step up to finance a hotel.

“Let them take the risk,” she said.

Rob English, a spokesman for BUILD – Baltimoreans United in Leadership Development – said he is pleased that Harris and Holton were able to secure more money for neighborhoods.

More Top Picks Best Stander Bed Rail Alternatives For Elderly

BUILD was instrumental in getting the administration to agree to establish an affordable housing trust fund of $59 million over five years as part of the hotel deal.

“The precedent we hope to set is that money for downtown is linked to uptown,” English said. “Now they’re using money from Hilton to go to scholarship funds. There’s never been a direct link between downtown development and neighborhood development. Until now.”

Mitchell had a more jaded view of the deals.

“It’s disappointing,” he said. “That’s the political process.”

Hotel promises

Mayor Martin O’Malley’s administration has made several pledges to win support for the publicly financed convention center hotel: