Developers plan Home2 Suites in downtown Albany

ALBANY — Pending a working agreement with the Albany City Commission, the group that brought the Hilton Garden Inn to downtown Albany plans to build a Home2 Suites hotel adjacent to the 101 S. Front St. hotel.

Rick Patton addressed the commission at its work session Tuesday morning, asking the board to allow a refinancing of the remaining $3.7 million owed on a loan the hotel group got when it opened the Hilton Garden Inn 10 years ago. Patton said if the city approves the refinancing, he’ll move forward with the process of bringing the Home2 Suites downtown.

“The numbers work for this product,” Greg Winey, president of the management company that’s helping Patton with the day-to-day operations of the Hilton property, told the board. “Home2 Suites, which is a sister property of Hilton and Homewood Suites, is a very hot property right now, and there are a couple of developers who want to put one by the Albany Mall. But Hilton has the first option, and we’d like to bring it downtown for a co-branding opportunity.”

When Patton said that there were no outside investors involved in the Hilton Garden Inn, Ward IV Commissioner Roger Marietta took exception.

“I think you could say the city is an investor,” Marietta said, a reference to the city’s $3.1 million bond investment in the hotel.

Patton later said he planned to pay back a half-million dollars of the money owed on the Hilton loan, and Marietta bluntly asked if he could pay more.

“Is there any way you could make a larger payment, maybe even pay back the entire loan?” Marietta asked. “It has been 10 years.”

Winey said that while the Hilton Garden Inn is making a profit downtown since his company took over management of the property, the margins were still thin. And, he added, the hotel has been the largest taxpayer downtown since its opening.

“We’ve hired more than 500 employees, paid more than $10 million in wages, paid $1.5 million in property taxes, paid $1.2 million in county sales tax and brought in $3.2 million in occupancy taxes,” Winey said. “And our 30,000 annual customers spend an additional $1.4 million outside the hotel, mostly at the mall in west Albany.

“We project that, with 20,000 annual customers at the Home2 hotel, the two properties would bring in a combined $2 million in spending outside the hotel. And, obviously, this hotel could help re-start downtown development.”

Patton said any talk of building a new hotel would need to involve planning for the entire city block from Oglethorpe Boulevard to the south, Front street to the east, Pine Avenue to the north and Washington Street to the west. Ward III Commissioner B.J. Fletcher told the developers they should work with Downtown Manager Sharlene Cannon, who will present a proposed downtown master plan next Tuesday.

Ward VI Commissioner Tommie Postell said he favors working with Patton and his group to bring the Home2 Suites downtown.

“They’ve got enough stuff going on in northwest Albany and Lee County,” Postell said. “I don’t care what they have going on out there. We need to bring something downtown, something that will benefit the citizens of the south, east, west and north.”

Patton said the new hotel could serve as a “great anchor” for downtown development, pointing out that space would be needed for parking.

Asked by Ward I Commissioner Jon Howard if construction of a new Waffle House restaurant adjacent to the hotel site would hurt plans to increase food and drink sales at the hotels, Winey said he didn’t think so.

“Will we have some of our guests eat at the Waffle House? Sure,” Winey said. “But since a lot of our clients get free breakfasts anyway, I don’t think they’ll have a major impact on our F&D business. I’ll tell you what, though. I guarantee you the Waffle House will love us.”

Commissioners agreed to talk more about the refinancing request so that they can take action by the board’s May 26 night meeting.