Granite Hotel deal falls through

“The short version is that in order to make a housing tax credit deal financially viable, close to 50 units are required,” he wrote.

“The Granite Hotel, which we and everyone we spoke with considered the cornerstone of the envisioned competitive funding application, would produce only 15 units and 2 storefronts.

“After very nearly finding another site or two that could have worked to produce the other 35 to 40 units, we ran into various obstacles that precluded them as the solution to our ‘scattered site’ proposal.”

Facing a June 17 deadline for a preliminary federal tax credit application and the deadline for the full application only four weeks after that, Todd said company officials realized the deal could not be worked out in time.

“We felt it better to sincerely say thank you to all the officials, landowners, architects and planners that we have met regarding the Winder 2010 effort and hopefully appreciate these relationships in future efforts.”

Waxing philosophical, Todd added: “Life is a network, and deals that are meant to be don’t go away. We have turned our minds to other strategies that might help the city with the hotel, but to use a baseball analogy, we're back in the dugout.”

Winder planning director Barry Edgar said Tuesday that Todd indicated the company might try again next year.

DDA chairman Mike Rice said Tuesday that he learned of the company’s decision that morning.

The authority owns the hotel but was not involved in developing the preliminary proposal that called for the structure to be redeveloped for the proposed mix of residential and business uses.

The city government has applied for a $500,000 grant to help refurbish the hotel. However, city leaders in recent months have expressed little interest in making any significant investment beyond that.

Local preservationists have taken on the challenge to help find additional grant funding.