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Trumbull Commissioners Advance Hotel Project
WARREN, Ohio -- A proposed $6.5 million hotel in Liberty Township moved a step closer to reality this morning, although the start of construction remains at least a couple of months off.
At their regularly scheduled meeting, Trumbull County Commissioners Frank Fuda, Paul Heltzel and Dan Polivka voted to receive an application for tax exemption filed by Perni, Perni Equities LLC, Hubbard, for the project.
The partnership, which includes a group of area doctors and the owners of the Holiday Inn Express in Boardman, plans to develop a 90-room Comfort Suites at the site of the former Ramada Inn, said Patrick Ungaro, township administrator. The property is situated in the Belmont Avenue Community Reinvestment Area designated last year by the Ohio Development Services Agency. The developers are seeking a 49% tax exemption for 10 years.
“There’s probably a few more months before all the paperwork that we have to do at the county level will be completed,” Fuda said.
On its application, the hotel developer set a March 2014 start date for construction and a March 2015 completion date, said Dave Dubiaga, Trumbull County community planning coordinator. But before construction can move forward, the Liberty Local Schools’ board of education must be notified, and Liberty Township trustees and Trumbull County commissioners must hold hearings and act on the abatement request, he said.
If approved, the exemption request would then go the Ohio Development Services Agency for final approval. “That is the last step in the development process,” Dubiaga said. In all, the process could take about two months. The Belmont Avenue CRA is the first in a township in Trumbull County “so I don’t know how fast it will move along,” he said.
Among those attending this morning’s meeting were representatives of the area building trades, who urged commissioners to encourage the hotel developer to employ local labor for the project.
“A lot of these hotel projects do go to out-of-town workers. Our people sit at home. They’re not paying sales taxes, they’re not using goods and services in this area,” said Mike Rapovy, representative for the Indiana/Kentucky/Ohio Regional Council of Carpenters. “We’re just trying to keep local work for local people,” he added.
Jody Stringer, business manager for Laborers International Union Local 935, also criticized companies that receive tax breaks but hire out-of-town contractors and don’t use local workers for their projects.
“We just want them to use just local people here in Trumbull and Mahoning counties and let them do the work,” Stringer remarked. “If they want something from the people here in Trumbull County, they can give something back to us.”
County sales tax collection numbers are down, Fuda noted. “Your comments are well received. We need local people on these jobs,’ he said.
Ungaro, who said the Liberty school board has been notified regarding the project, reported there are four 1-acre parcels at the front of the site available for development as well.
Copyright 2014 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
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