Downtown Hotel

Fisk developer works out
conversion plans with Marriott

By Greg Rohloff
Business Correspondent

Atop the Fisk Building sits the perfect hideaway for a two-story penthouse suite overlooking Polk Street.

"It's compelling in terms of the possibilities," said Robert DeShay, director of real estate for Newcrest Hotels and Newcrest Management.

One can almost hear the gears grinding over what could be for those two top floors, until the most deciding factor comes to light. There is no elevator to that level, and knowing that, the gears stop grinding over possibilities and return to the business of turning the Fisk into a 108-room Courtyard by Marriott, a project that will take as much as $12.7 million in remodeling costs.

Work is moving along on two fronts. While Newcrest works out the preliminary plans for rooms with Marriott officials, it also is lining up the financing, inquiring with two Amarillo banks and two in Dallas for lending terms, DeShay said.

Marriott has considerable experience with historic renovations and conversions of office buildings to hotels, DeShay said. The trick is to provide all the modern conveniences of a luxury hotel while maintaining the historic features of the building.

He points to the recent conversion of a century-old office building in downtown Memphis into a Courtyard by Marriott, as well as other projects that Marriott has worked with in Houston, Fort Worth, San Diego and Philadelphia. And although Newcrest is in the early stages of converting the Fisk into a hotel, changes have been made from the original plans, DeShay said. Marriott had wanted 125 rooms, but that was scaled back to maintain the room size in accordance with Marriott's standards. The old outside fire escape would have been enclosed, according to early plans, but Marriott wants an interior fire escape, DeShay said. Once Marriott and Newcrest agree on the plans, they will be submitted to city building officials as part of the construction permit process. That will likely be done no later than September, he said. That would allow for the removal of asbestos; DeShay said this could take as much as 12 months, with the plan requiring approval from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.

The second phase of construction would be to convert the office layout of each of the 10 floors into layouts for the hotel rooms, plus a full-service restaurant with bar, a small convenience store and a Starbucks, all on the first floor. The Starbucks, which will require about 1,000 to 1,200 square feet of space, will require taking part of the first floor of the adjacent parking garage, DeShay said.

The Fisk project is the second downtown building conversion to gain tax incentives through the Tax Increment Reinvestment Zone with reimbursement of up to $1.6 million in property taxes over the next 20 years, depending upon the increase in the property's value.

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Posted: July 3, 2008