Council holds public hearing on hotel agreement

The agreement is largely the same as the term sheet approved by council on Oct. 22; Hammons will pay $7 million for the land and the neighboring car park, and will then build a 150- to 200-room hotel on the vacant property. Sale of the property must close by Sept. 30, with construction to begin within 60 days of the closing date and be completed in 24 months.

Hammons will build connections between the car park, the hotel and the expo center. Additionally, he will complete renovations of the expo center’s kitchen.

Hammons also agrees to sell part of his property at St. Louis Street and John Q. Hammons Parkway to Kansas City-based Opus Northwest LLC, which plans to build a new headquarters for accounting firm BKD LLP. BKD currently is in Hammons Tower across the street.

The major change between the term sheet and the final agreement is the hotel. The term sheet stated that the hotel must be an Embassy Suites, while the final agreement says the hotel must be a “high-quality hotel franchise associated with a nationally recognized hotel franchisor” with both a national reservation system and a national points accrual system.

Councilwoman Mary Collette said she was impressed with the final result of the yearlong development process.

“For a really long time it looked like we were going to have to pick between having BKD stay in center city or having a hotel in center city with all the breakout rooms and meeting rooms that the (Springfield Convention and Visitors Bureau) has been looking for,” she said, referring to the original plan to have both a hotel and BKD facility on the 1.7-acre site. “It just really feels like everybody got what they needed.”

Council could vote on the development agreement as soon as its Feb. 5 luncheon.

See SBJ’s Feb. 4 issue for more from Monday’s City Council meeting.