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Downtown Knoxville Hoteliers File 25,000 Signatures to
 Seek Referendum to Block Public Subsidy for
 Proposed Convention Center Hotel
By Hayes Hickman, The Knoxville News-Sentinel, Tenn.
Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News

Oct. 31, 2003 - Downtown hoteliers filed 10,000 more signatures Thursday than the 15,000 required to initiate a referendum on whether to allow any public subsidy for a proposed headquarters hotel to serve the Knoxville Convention Center.

Knox County Election Commission officials now have 30 days to certify the more than 3,000 pages and 25,000 names of registered city voters before it's decided whether the petition is valid.

But as the managers of the four major downtown hotels stood outside the Old Knox County Courthouse with more than a dozen employees at their side, they all seemed confident that their efforts would prove successful.

"Today is a victory for democracy," said Ken Knight, general manger of the Radisson Summit Hill Knoxville. "Hopefully, today, we'll give the voters and taxpayers of Knoxville a chance to have their voices heard."

Among the five proposals before the city's Industrial Development Board, the Holiday Inn Select and the downtown Hilton have submitted renovation plans that would upgrade either facility to serve the year-old convention center.

However, representatives with all four hotels contend that the city's plans to build a new hotel on the site of the state Supreme Court Building would create unfair competition for the existing hotels, and eventually drive one of them out of business.

According to its language, the petition's proposed ordinance to prohibit any city funds for a new hotel would not apply to public funding for the renovation of an existing hotel. It also includes exceptions that would allow the city to offer lease or tax abatements for such renovations.

Mike Butler, general manager of the Hilton, said a privately funded $5 million renovation of his hotel is under way. It includes room and lobby upgrades, as well as the addition of a coffee shop, health club, meeting spaces and a new elevator.

Butler said the work should be completed by January.

The Holiday Inn's General Manager Walter Wojnar said renovations at his hotel recently began and should be finished by the end of February.

Wojnar said he could not provide a cost estimate for the work.

But Chattanooga developer and owner of the Holiday Inn, Franklin Haney, previously announced plans in January to upgrade the 21-year-old building to a Crown Plaza, with nearly $11 million of work.

Mayor Victor Ashe has accused Haney of making empty promises for such upgrades for years, and attacked Haney again Thursday for hiring a Nevada-based firm to collect city voters' signatures for the petition.

"Haney employed out-of-state intruders to circulate the petitions," Ashe said in a written statement. "Taxpayers have been deceived in the petition drive as to what this petition really does. It halts money for a new hotel but safeguards it for an existing hotel. The hypocrisy is breath-taking."

However, the term-limited Ashe said he would defer to Mayor-elect Bill Haslam to decide what steps, if any, the city should take if the petition is certified.

If the petition is certified, the City Charter provides City Council the first opportunity to consider the proposed ordinance. Council can approve the public subsidy prohibition, or vote it down to allow a referendum during the August general election next year.

-----To see more of The Knoxville News-Sentinel or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.knoxnews.com.

(c) 2003, The Knoxville News-Sentinel, Tenn. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News. IHG, HLT,

 
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