Omni Hotel

[G.Walker]

How does the increase in tax revenue compare with the current and future costs of the public subsidy, interest, and maintenance of the facilities? And also compared with other possible land uses on the same parcel that may not require a public subsidy?

Good point.

Addressing Urbanized, I understand where you are coming from, but the average resident in Oklahoma City & metro area will not be using CC or the CC hotel. I have lived here almost 20 years, and can count on one hand how many times I have been to the Cox Center.

Sure tax dollars will pour into restaurants, hotels, etc...but as krisb said, does the financing & accoutnability level out with how much we will have to pay long-term? I am not against the CC or CC hotel, just think that the city could of found a better use of $500 million dollars. Why not put that in police/fire safety, education, & health. That is where you will get the most impact for your city. Most of the MAP3 projects are "leisure" projects, not projects centered around acually improving the quality of life of citizens of the city.

[ChrisHayes]

Good point.

Addressing Urbanized, I understand where you are coming from, but the average resident in Oklahoma City & metro area will not be using CC or the CC hotel. I have lived here almost 20 years, and can count on one hand how many times I have been to the Cox Center.

Sure tax dollars will pour into restaurants, hotels, etc...but as krisb said, does the financing & accoutnability level out with how much we will have to pay long-term? I am not against the CC or CC hotel, just think that the city could of found a better use of $500 million dollars. Why not put that in police/fire safety, education, & health. That is where you will get the most impact for your city. Most of the MAP3 projects are "leisure" projects, not projects centered around acually improving the quality of life of citizens of the city.

Increasing leisure increases quality of life. As far as I can tell, all of the MAPS projects from the start have increased quality of life in the city.

[Laramie]

Increasing leisure increases quality of life. As far as I can tell, all of the MAPS projects from the start have increased quality of life in the city.

It will also pump new money (from out-of-state) into the OKC economy; this is how you grow your community. That's why many cities want to attract new money from out-of-state.

The more we grow our hotels; we increase room night availability.

Downtown Hotel Summary: http://www.okctalk.com/showthread.ph...682#post659682

The more events & attractions we can lure will allow OKC to keep a steady diet to feed these hotels because the more hotels you have available; you increase chances of being awarded certain regional & national events.

[mugofbeer]

It will also pump new money (from out-of-state) into the OKC economy; this is how you grow your community. That's why many cities want to attract new money from out-of-state.

The more we grow our hotels; we increase room night availability.

Downtown Hotel Summary: http://www.okctalk.com/showthread.ph...682#post659682

The more events & attractions we can lure will allow OKC to keep a steady diet to feed these hotels because the more hotels you have available; you increase chances of being awarded certain regional & national events.

+1. With additional revenues going to pay for police, fire, streets, etc. These types of projects and facilities are investments. When you don't make and maintain your investments, you lose events and lose the ability to pay for things like fire, police and streets

[Rover]

And, to be a full service modern city you need to act like one and support a full range of competitive services ...like conventions and meetings.

[Urbanized]

...I am not against the CC or CC hotel, just think that the city could of found a better use of $500 million dollars. Why not put that in police/fire safety, education, & health...

First of all, you are now making an argument against MAPS in general. Second, you understand, don’t you, that increasing the overall tax collection via this type of economic development (room nights, meals, goods and services purchased by visitors to our city) by definition increases available monies for police, fire, safety, etc.? The very point of this project is to increase sales tax collection going to the general fund, which it quite clearly will do.

Also, MAPS 3 was quite clear in which projects were to be built. It is a CAPITAL IMPROVEMENTS tax, and voters went to the polls believing they were there to fund a convention center, among other things. This tax could not be suddenly switched to a public safety tax, subverting the will of the majority of voters who participated in the process. Because if we are still debating whether or not the CC should happen at all, that’s what is being suggested, right? We can’t do this. The point is moot. Besides, we very recently DID pass new public safety funding (which will now include greater collections due to aforementioned taxes gained from CC use).

Debating whether or not the CC should happen at all is a waste of energy and bandwidth. It’s happening. THIS thread is about the hotel. I suppose it’s fair in this thread to discuss how/why it came to be, but it is also happening. The fact of the matter the hotel is required for the City (and its taxpayers) to fully benefit from our new convention center, for ways I have described many times before in this thread, so I won’t bore. Suffice to say it is a must, and public participation is a must, for reasons I’ve also described. Again, in a nutshell, the REAL point of public involvement for the hotel is to allow the City (via the CVB) to have some say in room blocks and discounted rates to lure events, which again bring NEW tax dollars to our economy.

Regarding whether the City Council has the authority to do such deals without a vote of the people, OF COURSE they do. They manage an annual budget of more than a billion dollars. The City does deals all of the time for millions of dollars. They have multiple legal mechanisms at their disposal whereby to do so, Over a decade ago they put together funding deal to save the Skirvin hotel; more than $50 million. They did this using similar instruments to what are being used for the CC hotel.

The fact of the matter is, the City 100% has the discretion to do deals like this. It’s why we as voters have hired them, at the polls. If you have questions or complaints about how they are doing their job, you as a voter and taxpayer have the right to dismiss it with them. Go to meetings and ask questions. E-mail your councilperson. Call them. Call the council offices and ask to meet your council person. They are very accessible. If you don’t like the answers you’re given, tell them. Support an opposition candidate in the next election. Run yourself. Whatever. But the fact of the matter is that it is 100% in their purview to do projects like this one.

[Urbanized]

By the way, regarding Strong Towns, I concur that it is a great blog and great resource. I am a voracious reader of it, as you can see from how often I personally tweet links back to it, or retweet their postings. But to suggest OKC’s leaders are unaware of it is innacurate; the Downtown OKC Partnership brought Chuck Marohn - Strong Towns Founder and President - to OKC a couple of years ago, where he met with prominent OKC leaders and developers. He even did a podcast while here, I think. And to say that OKC is “...doing all of the things Strong Towns advocates say not to do...” is a wild and disingenuous overstatement.

[Laramie]

Urbanized has spoken +1

[GaryOKC6]

First of all, you are now making an argument against MAPS in general. Second, you understand, don’t you, that increasing the overall tax collection via this type of economic development (room nights, meals, goods and services purchased by visitors to our city) by definition increases available monies for police, fire, safety, etc.? The very point of this project is to increase sales tax collection going to the general fund, which it quite clearly will do.

Also, MAPS 3 was quite clear in which projects were to be built. It is a CAPITAL IMPROVEMENTS tax, and voters went to the polls believing they were there to fund a convention center, among other things. This tax could not be suddenly switched to a public safety tax, subverting the will of the majority of voters who participated in the process. Because if we are still debating whether or not the CC should happen at all, that’s what is being suggested, right? We can’t do this. The point is moot. Besides, we very recently DID pass new public safety funding (which will now include greater collections due to aforementioned taxes gained from CC use).

Debating whether or not the CC should happen at all is a waste of energy and bandwidth. It’s happening. THIS thread is about the hotel. I suppose it’s fair in this thread to discuss how/why it came to be, but it is also happening. The fact of the matter the hotel is required for the City (and its taxpayers) to fully benefit from our new convention center, for ways I have described many times before in this thread, so I won’t bore. Suffice to say it is a must, and public participation is a must, for reasons I’ve also described. Again, in a nutshell, the REAL point of public involvement for the hotel is to allow the City (via the CVB) to have some say in room blocks and discounted rates to lure events, which again bring NEW tax dollars to our economy.

Regarding whether the City Council has the authority to do such deals without a vote of the people, OF COURSE they do. They manage an annual budget of more than a billion dollars. The City does deals all of the time for millions of dollars. They have multiple legal mechanisms at their disposal whereby to do so, Over a decade ago they put together funding deal to save the Skirvin hotel; more than $50 million. They did this using similar instruments to what are being used for the CC hotel.

The fact of the matter is, the City 100% has the discretion to do deals like this. It’s why we as voters have hired them, at the polls. If you have questions or complaints about how they are doing their job, you as a voter and taxpayer have the right to dismiss it with them. Go to meetings and ask questions. E-mail your councilperson. Call them. Call the council offices and ask to meet your council person. They are very accessible. If you don’t like the answers you’re given, tell them. Support an opposition candidate in the next election. Run yourself. Whatever. But the fact of the matter is that it is 100% in their purview to do projects like this one.

+++ Very well put!

[krisb]

By the way, regarding Strong Towns, I concur that it is a great blog and great resource. I am a voracious reader of it, as you can see from how often I personally tweet links back to it, or retweet their postings. But to suggest OKC’s leaders are unaware of it is innacurate; the Downtown OKC Partnership brought Chuck Marohn - Strong Towns Founder and President - to OKC a couple of years ago, where he met with prominent OKC leaders and developers. He even did a podcast while here, I think. And to say that OKC is “...doing all of the things Strong Towns advocates say not to do...” is a wild and disingenuous overstatement.

I did not say the city was unaware of Strong Towns, just that we have failed to embrace most if not all of their guiding principles, which is probably worse than doing things out of total ignorance. Downtown OKC and ULI (which hosted the events with Chuck) are usually more progressive than the City itself when it comes to issues of sustainability and responsible land use. As I recall from the podcast, Chuck asked some tough questions and seemed less than enthused with our over-reliance on huge civic projects and federal matching dollars. MAPS in the pay as you go form is very Strong Towns, but the projects have all been very expensive and not on the incremental, granular scale. What has the City learned and actually implemented from that conversation with Chuck a few years back? It's a positive step to at least know what you don't know, but then what are we doing about it?

[G.Walker]

Boom!

http://newsok.com/oklahoma-city-conv...rticle/5578173

[stile99]

" the hotel will feature a tower that is oriented to minimize its shadow footprint on the new park across Robinson Avenue."

It's nice to see they are thinking ahead, but I have read absolutely zero stories about people bothered about the shade of a tall building on a hot day, and far too many where the sun reflecting off the glass caused issues up to and including starting fires.

[Pete]

Yes, very strange they would have the hotel mainly fronting the boulevard rather than the new, huge park.

BTW, I had talked to the director of the Myriad Gardens who will also be overseeing Scissortail Park and she said shade from downtown structures had very little impact on the horticulture and any small issues were easily handled through a planting plan.

[Pete]

BTW, this design shows very little change from their original proposal.

[tyeomans]

What is the projected height?

[HangryHippo]

Yeah, that design is pretty damn boring. A little curve at the corner (similar to the Dallas OMNI) where some rooms could overlook the park would have looked awesome.

[warreng88]

Two things that stood out to me that I didn't previously know:

1. "Another feature of the design unique to Oklahoma City is the creation of an underground drive from the garage to the hotel's drop off for guests. By building the connection, along with underground parking for about 20 cars, Omni is designing a hotel that won't cause traffic backups for valet parking." Interesting that they did this. I don't know if I have ever seen it before.

2. "O'Connor, meanwhile, is working on potential plans to wrap the garage with workforce housing that could change the city's cost for the structure. I remember in the original plans for the Core to Shore area, there were plans for townhomes along the convention center/hotel facing the park. I am curious how the logistics of that would work. The title work/surveying on that would be a nightmare to separate it from the building itself.

[mkjeeves]

From the article .... the hotel will front the future downtown boulevard with restaurants and bars designed also to draw visitors at the future Scissortail Park.

If I have the location right, the cafe being built in the park is a block west down Boulevard from the hotel. I do wonder about the cafe being a component of the park, and how it will play with other services in the area. More is more? I assume the primary function of the park cafe will be to serve those attending events at the stage and on the oval, rather than day to day business. Somewhat related...does the cafe that was built at Myriad Gardens get any use?

[David]

I like it, but I am a little surprised they aren't taking more advantage of the park frontage.

[Rover]

I like it, but I am a little surprised they aren't taking more advantage of the park frontage.

I believe they said the restaurants face the park, as well as deck area above facing the park. Looks like the loading and unloading is on the boulevard side, which is better than using the parkside, imo. You would think the rooms on the south would have a pretty good park view, and the rooms on the north would have a spectacular cityscape view.

[catch22]

Unless I'm facing an ocean or large body of water (or something I'm really interested in), I don't like east or west facing rooms due to sunlight in the morning or a hot room in the afternoon in the summer.

I don't think that is probably a huge factor, but it's one I consider when booking hotels and a request when checking in.

[Plutonic Panda]

Huge fail. I can not wrap my head around why they chose this layout. They could have hired a professional botanists that would have told them this building would have no significant impact on the vegetation. This once again reeks of OKC not understanding how to do things bigger cities have done for decades with success. I mean I guess other cities that have parks with much larger buildings adjacent just don't know what they're doing. I guess people in the hotel would rather look at a convention center or an arena than a park.

The design really isn't that bad. It's the layout I don't like. I'd even be happy with a compromise and have an L shaped tower at the corner. They even can charge premiums for having a park view. The way I think they should really do it is reduce the footprint of the entire structure including the podium(that would add about 10-15 storeys or so), shove a garage over the new aligned Broadway Ave., give it a Vegas Style entrance, and then you'd have some extra land to sale to developers where the parking garage would have been.

[Laramie]

Could there be something on the horizon (5-7 years) with the Producers Coop Mill since that site nears clearance. They still need to do the toxic clean-up; however it will make the area more attractive for OKC's next building boom.

The 17-story 605-room Omni Hotel & a city built garage are the last components next to new convention center will front the future downtown boulevard with amenities designed to draw visitors to the future Scissortail Park.

Remember: Omni hotels has first rights on the Cox Convention Center site if a hotel is to be developed on that site, the streetcar is on that route. The future looks bright & ripe for downtown development.

[Pete]

It's actually going to look a lot like the 15-story downtown Sheraton.

[hoya]

I wonder if they don't want half their rooms facing the now-bulldozed Co-op site. If that takes 15 years to develop, maybe Omni would rather give up the park view to avoid the view to the east.