Aberdeen Hotel Proposal Designed To Spark Change
Aberdeen hotel proposal designed to spark change
The project includes renovation of an 82-year-old hotel and two blocks that surround it.
By ANNIE MARTIN Journal Staff Reporter
A group called Aberdeen Development, LLC plans to purchase the 82-year- old Morck Hotel in downtown Aberdeen and start a $12 million renovation this fall that will be completed by the fall of 2007.
The group is also buying major portions of two blocks around the hotel, and plans to build 50 condos and 50,000 square feet of new retail space that will include a steak house, an urban bistro and martini bar, day spa, brew pub, galleries and a 300-car parking garage.
Rice Fergus Miller is the architect, but the general contractor is not yet final, Trabucco said.
The city of Aberdeen approved a measure last week to provide $300,000 in low- interest loans for the project. The city will also seek a federal appropriation of over $5.5 million for the garage and sidewalk improvements.
Trabucco was inspired to renovate the hotel when Tim Quigg of Quigg Brothers, a marine and major construction company from Grays Harbor, came to the Hotel Elliott in Astoria. Quigg asked to speak to Trabucco and told him about the Morck Hotel.
After visiting Aberdeen and seeing the site, Trabucco and Quigg formed a limited liability corporation along with Molly Sanders, a long-time associate and partner in other ventures with Trabucco. Others in the LLC are John Yonich, CEO of Holley Moulding in Bellevue and a former Aberdeen resident, and John Harder and Eric Jacobsen, principals in Sunwest Management, a national assisted-living company.
The hotel’s current owners are Bill Lipscomb and Bob Annis. They have also contributed money toward the purchase and will be minority partners.
“There have been many more people before us taking a whack but we’re going to be one more piece of it,” Trabucco said of efforts to improve Aberdeen’s economy.
Rice Fergus Miller partner Mike Miller said he hopes the renovation will attract people and business to his hometown. Miller described the Morck as Aberdeen’s “grand old hotel” where many of the city’s celebrations — from birthdays to wedding receptions — took place.
“It will act as a catalyst to redevelop the block and spur development in an economically depressed town,” Miller said. “It’s a big deal to have somebody talking about doing this, let alone actually doing it.”
The developers are working with other property owners in downtown Aberdeen to expand and redevelop the area.
Miller said other improvements being considered include moving the Tall Ships Sea Port near the hotel and creating a connection to the Chehalis River by building a pedestrian bridge over the railroad tracks.