Councillor Calvin T. Brown
Supports New Hotel
The structure pictured above will look exactly like the hotel to be built near to the Wyndham Hotel. Ground will be broken sometime soon for a Marriott Residence, as it will be known. It constitutes a $20 million investment.
The Marriott Corporation passed papers and took possession of three acres of valuable Chelsea land on Maple Street Wednesday afternoon at Chelsea City Hall. Marriott will be building a 128-room Marriott Residence Hotel on the site.
The hotel giant paid the city $1,865,000 for a two acre plot where the hotel will be built and purchased as well an additional acre for parking and further development across the street from the designated hotel site.
In all, the city sold three acres to Marriott in the development area diagonally down the street from the Wyndham Hotel site.
“This did not happen overnight. I began negotiations with Marriott almost 10 years ago and finally, we got them to sign on the dotted line,” City Manager Jay Ash said. “Finishing this development project successfully was one of the main reasons I wanted to remain at my job. This development is just one of a number of terrific things we have going on in the city,” added the city manager, who recently signed on for another four years.
The Residence Inn is Marriott’s top extended stay brands. Extended stay guests typically rent rooms for longer visits than do guests in other hotel categories. Because guests stay longer, rooms are typically larger and the hotel offers more amenities to make their guests fell at home.
The structure’s exterior will be faced with imposing red brick and sand stone exterior.
Chelsea Gateway Properties is expected to spend almost $20 million for the build out and the subsequent furnishing of what will be Chelsea’s second major hotel complex. CGP will develop and manage the property.
Groundbreaking will take place some time during this summer.
In addition, CGP executives predict that at minimum nearly 40 jobs will be created. The hotel will have a small restaurant with a limited menu to service guests primarily.
“This is a great product for Chelsea,” exclaimed Richard Pantano, Chairman of the Chelsea Economic Development Board. “The Marriott is exactly the type of development we have envisioned for our urban renewal district, and why we have been so careful in selecting redevelopers to carry out that vision.”
Pantano says his board has heard from those who wanted to develop “no-name hotels and strip malls,” but the board continued to work with Manager Ash to find the right developer who would continue to elevate Chelsea’s presence as a hub for hotel visitors
The Marriott is expected to generate an estimated $500,000 in hotel excise and property taxes its first year and $200,000 in one-time building fees. In order to help secure the development, the City and CGP agreed to a five-year tax relief deal that will provide approximately $160,000 in property tax relief to the development each year over a five year period.
“We will see and feel the impact of this development in so many ways, not to mention the increased tax revenues that will help support municipal services,” Ash said.
The city is still awaiting word from the nation’s capitol about the final review on the FBI project announced for Everett Avenue.
At the same time, city officials said they are trying to move forward a major residential housing development on Sixth Street. There are also possibilities for major construction in the MarketBasket Mall.
The spectacular One Webster project – 120 units of residential housing at the corner of Eastern and Webster Avenues – is nearing completion. It is another perceived feather in the cap for Ash and for the City Council.
An Entire Community doing the Right Thing
The Zoning Board of Appeals has turned back a bid by a local company to locate a factory style operation in a vacant building complex in the waterfront district. In doing so, the board has shown that it acts in concert with the needs and concerns of the neighborhood and with the more expansive needs and concerns of the city as a whole.
The Zoning Board has done the right thing. We agree with its decision, which was based on information it gathered from the public during three meetings and through e-mails and testimony given by residents who would have been directly affected by the proposed tortilla factory.
Everyone’s interest was solicited and everyone had their say.
In the end, the tortilla factory development failed because of concerns about noise, odors, rodents, added truck traffic and longer hours of operation in a densely populated area that is largely residential and historic as well.
Board Chairman John DePreist excluded no one from commenting and went to great lengths to hear and to listen to all sides in this neighborhood battle.
The manner with which he conducted the meetings were worthy of a Soloman.
He was fair. He was open. He was patient and when he ruled, it was on the basis of the facts as they were presented to him.
The other board members are to be complimented for doing the same.
There was a time when who you are was more important to board members in this city than what you were proposing. Votes by nearly all the boards were commonly out of sync with the people and in the end, everything became a muddle and a mess.
Not so in the modern Chelsea.
Pro or con you got your say. Pro or con, the board members weighed all the issues.
Pro or con, everyone was civil and the meeting was open and honest and in the end, justice was done to this issue of a factory coming to the historic waterfront district.
Everyone involved is to be congratulated for the high manner of conduct that was witnessed.
This is the way things are done in modern Chelsea, where this city today stands as the example by which other cities would emulate.
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