City approves hotel agreement despite councilors' concerns

Sep. 9—PLATTSBURGH — Despite opposition from several city councilors, the development agreement for a potential hotel at the City of Plattsburgh's harborside was approved Thursday.

As previously reported by the Press-Republican, the city has been working with developer GP Manager PLF, LLC for months now on potentially developing a hotel on the parcel located next to the Plattsburgh City Marina off of Dock Street.

Councilors were originally set to vote on a development agreement with this developer in early August but eventually tabled it, citing the need for past reports about the site's soil that were completed when the parcel was being primed for hotel development by Monahan Development Corp. of Syracuse more than 15 years ago.

After the reports were made available to councilors, the development agreement was then reintroduced to the Common Council at Thursday's meeting.

Though the agreement was again met with opposition from several councilors, including Elizabeth Gibbs (D-Ward 3), who said she still can't support the project moving forward.

She said the risk remains that the city might have to reimburse the developer for any site cleanup that takes place there after the sale occurs.

The property is valued at $1.2 million but it was estimated at earlier meetings that site cleanup could cost up to $300,000.

"Which really means the sale of that property is going to be a total of $900,000," Gibbs speculated.

Continuing her list of reasons of disapproval for the hotel agreement, Gibbs said the city might have to shell out funds for other unforeseen expenses; she doesn't want to go into an agreement with an LLC; and the flood plain map, which currently shows the property not in a flood plain, could potentially change in a few years due to climate change.

"I can't support this for all those reasons that I've said. The risk vs. reward is for private industry," she said.

"Risk vs. reward is not what we do as a municipality ... and I don't think that this is something that we should take a risk on."

Piggybacking off of Gibbs' comments, Councilor Jeff Moore (D-Ward 6) said "There's gonna be a lot of peripheral costs that are going to be added to this project," including improving road access in that area.

Councilor Caitlin Bopp (D-Ward 5), who, including Gibbs, was one of the councilors who requested access to the old soil reports in August, added that she was actually satisfied with the information she received from them.

"If we're saying property is worth $1.2 million, but then it does indeed need remediation, then it is worth less, it is indeed worth $900,000. So I'm OK with us getting less for it if it is indeed worth less. It's the same way it would work in a housing deal. That's the way it would work in anything," Bopp said.

"As far as the road and the surrounding waterfront areas that are there, the cleanup for those is already part of our Harborside Master Plan that we've been working on for so long, which will directly feed into the function and feasibility of this hotel area."

She also disagreed with Gibbs' assessment of the property.

"I also feel very, very strongly that a hotel is desperately needed in this area. and again, what are we doing? We're letting the site sit here languishing without any use. Other businesses have already proven they can be successful in that area ... I think it will be something that continues to improve the character of our city and its usability."

Councilor Jennifer Tallon (D-Ward 4) shared similar optimism saying "there's a company that is willing to take a chance on our city.

"They believe in us, they think they'll have success here. So the question is do you believe in our city? Do you want to see success for our city?" she asked.

"People always talk about how we never have this or we never have that, this is something that we can show, yes, we can have this here and this can be successful, and I need to keep reminding people that the city is not building this hotel, so let's take a chance on this."

But before voting could take place, Moore raised another concern over city code 24-3, which, based on his interpretation, states that the sale of city property would require three quarters of the council to approve it — something he apparently anticipated the agreement would not receive.

City attorney Dean Schneller did not have a definitive answer to Moore's concern at the time.

In what began a heated debate, Councilor Mike Kelly (D-Ward 2) said they needed to start working together, highlighting that Gibbs will usually vote against "anything Mayor Rosenquest wants to do."

"But we need to get past that. We need to get to a point where we can say we people ... are interested in doing what's best for our city."

Continuing on Moore's concern, Gibbs felt the necessary votes would not be there either, saying they would most likely need five affirmative votes for it to legally pass.

Kelly then questioned how Gibbs knew how everyone was going to vote. She then said she was only asking a question and told Kelly to not interrupt her with his "manterruptions."

After some back and forth, Mayor Chris Rosenquest told them to keep it civil. Gibbs retorted that she "will not be attacked."

A vote on the development agreement was then held and the resolution subsequently passed, despite the concerns about the needed vote threshold going unanswered.

The decision unsurprisingly split the council with Councilors Julie Baughn (D-Ward 1), Gibbs and Moore voting against it and Councilors Kelly, Tallon and Bopp voting for it.

The mayor broke the tie by voting in favor of the agreement, which allowed it to pass.

Later Thursday evening, an email from Schneller to councilors was forwarded to the media explaining he would be reviewing the city code before the agreement was officially signed.

"Following tonight's vote, in light of the magnitude of this project and potential ambiguities in the code, I will be completing a further review of city code section 24-3 to determine the voting threshold for this motion. This review will be completed, and reported back to the council as soon as possible and certainly before the Mayor will sign any development agreement," Schneller wrote.

"In the future I ask that, when able, Councilors ask me these types of procedural questions in advance of the meetings."

When asked for an update on his review of the city code Friday afternoon, Schneller did not respond by press time.

Email: cnewton@pressrepublican.com

Twitter: CarlySNewton