Plaza Hotel plans expansion and new convention center

Owners of the Plaza Hotel on Carson Street are moving forward with plans to expand the hotel by adding 30 suites and building a conference center across the street.

The city's Redevelopment Authority Citizens Committee agreed Wednesday the owners should be paid $100,000 in city redevelopment funds to help with the project. The Board of Supervisors, acting as the redevelopment agency, will need to approve the payment.

"This is just what we've been asking for," said Supervisor Robin Williamson, also chairwoman of the redevelopment agency.

Mike Millard, project manager for hotel owners Millard Realty, said the company has already started the process of demolishing an existing single-story motel adjacent to its main hotel building on Carson Street. The older hotel faces Ninth Street.

A new three-story building will be built in place of the old motel with 30 upscale suites. Traffic patterns around the hotel complex will be altered to allow one-way traffic with diagonal parking.

The company applied for $100,000 from the city to help pay for facade improvements and landscaping for the $1.1 million project.

"We're going to have a lot more uniformity down there," Millard said.

City redevelopment manager Joe McCarthy said the project meets a main goal of the city's economic vitality plan, which is to draw tourism to the downtown area.

"It's truly a program we've been looking forward to ... in an area we want to focus on," McCarthy told the citizen's committee.

McCarthy has indicated recently the location around Red's Old 395 Grill, Copeland Lumber and the Carson Mall is an area where the city is attempting to draw new "mixed-use" development.

"I think there's some big, exciting things that are going to happen in this downtown area," Millard said.

Millard Realty has made an offer on the Wylie's Copy Center property on Ninth Street and plans to build a two-story, 3,500-square-feet Plaza Conference Center in 2004, Millard said. The center will be marketed for weddings, employment training, business training and retreats.

The goal is to tie in the area from the state Capitol to Gottschalks in the Carson Mall, he said.

The city's redevelopment agency gets its funding from a portion of property tax paid by businesses in the downtown redevelopment zone. This year the agency will have roughly $400,000 to allocate.

"Our budget is tight," McCarthy said.

Following the committee's approval of the funding, the application will be forwarded to the city redevelopment agency for its meeting on either Oct. 2 or Oct. 16.