MIDDLETOWN — The proposed plans to develop a“Middletown Center” will undergo further review at a future Planning Board special meeting as the panel needs time to consider the comments provided by several residents who questioned key aspects of the design.
“I always thought, when I heard what they were going to do with this land, (that it) was for the community,” resident Kim Blass said at thepublic hearing on April 21. “Looking at this tonight, (it) does not look like it’s for the community.”
The plan calls forretail, restaurants, residential housing, a community center and a 144-room hotel along 15 acres on West Main Road, from Coddington Highway to Valley Road.
While the Planning Board unanimously voted to declare the plans were generally consistent with the town’s Comprehensive Plan, the board decided to reconvene for a special meeting so it could pore over comments from residents who attended the public hearing before making further recommendations to the Town Council.
Most of the residents who came forward to speak lamented the inclusion of another hotel at the proposed development, arguing the town already has several hotels and does not need another.
Why the hotel is needed in the plan
However, the development team’s attorney, Girard Galvin, told the board that the development team would not move forward with the project if the hotel was removed or significantly reduced in scale.
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“My sense from my work with this team is that the substance of these elements — the hotel, the retail and the apartments — those are elements that have to be a part of it,” said Galvin, who also serves as assistant city solicitor in Newport. “There are elements of those concerns we’ve heard tonight that we will certainly discuss and try to incorporate or address, but in terms of elimination of the hotel or drastic reduction of it, those would be a nonstarter for the development team. It just can’t happen without these elements in substantially the size and format that they exist.”
The team proposing the project is led by real estate developers Christopher Bicho, James Karam and Rocky Kempenaar, all of whom have invested in hotel and apartment complex properties throughout Middletown and Newport in the past.
During the concept plan presentation, Karam addressed a few concerns residents had with the proposed hotel. Karam’s company, First Bristol Corporation, partnered with Kempenaar Real Estate in previous years to build the Hampton Inn, Homewood Suitesand Marriott Residences in Middletown.
Karam argued the hotel would benefit the city through taxes and by increasing hotel capacity. The hotel would also have extended-stay suites in addition to traditional hotel rooms to cater to Naval Station Newport and U.S. Naval War Collegeevents and student programs.
“The Navy built a new hotel on the base because they were concerned they weren’t going to have enough rooms,” Karam said. “If we are able to take care of this need, we will satisfy the Navy, and the state and town will have the benefit of the three taxes that take place on a hotel.”
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The Greater Newport Chamber of Commerce and the Aquidneck Land Trust each submitted letters in favor of the project concept as drafted by the development team. Joseph Pratt, board chair for theChamber of Commerce, said the rising costs of hotel rooms, the high occupancy rates and increased demand for AirBnbs indicate the market is in need of additional hotel rooms.
“We believe the redevelopment of this area will be an economic engine for this town,” Pratt said. “We believe it has the potential to significantly revitalize the area and impact the broader economy on multiple fronts.”
Retired Navy serviceman and current Middletown resident Mark Donahue spoke during the public forum portion of the evening to express doubt as to whether the proposed hotel would help supply hotel capacity for visitors to the college and base as hotel rates in Middletown are generally affordable for most Navy families.
“This hotel is not going to solve that problem,” Donahue said. “I guarantee you they aren’t going to be offering rates that would be affordable to these folks. Maybe I’m wrong.I hope I am, because otherwise I don’t see the role a hotel plays there.”
Placement of new library, hotel causes concern
Other than the hotel, the concept plan also includes six multi-story residential apartments with a community center and pool for residents;six commercial buildings;a public green space with an amphitheater,and a new municipal-use space, which Bicho said could work as a new public library to replace the one currently sitting on the development site.
Sarah Gough, chair of the Middletown Library Board of Trustees, told the Planning Board and development team Thursday the floor of the current library is cracking and sinking into the ground due to the weight of the books, which is why they need a new building. For that reason, she said the town should look into a geological study for the parcel, as she does consider it worth developing.
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She also raised concerns over the 4,000-square-foot size reduction between the proposed building and the current building, as well as the library’s relocation to the back of the development, partially hidden from West Main Road by one of the residential complexes.
“My own impression is that you’ve built the million dollar mansion, but then you remembered you had to have your shed for your bicycles for your kids,” Gough said. “So, a bone was thrown.”
Earlier in the meeting, Croce also shared his concerns about the location of the library. The city listed “A Town Center that offers common space for community gatherings,” which “might retain some level of municipal use” in the goals for development of the land as a part of its Request for Information.
“If this is truly to be the gateway to Middletown and be called the Middletown Center, I would think you would want to diminish the impact of the hotel and increase the impact of the municipal building,” Croce said. “Perhaps that corner location is a nice location for the town library rather than sticking it in the back of the area. After all, it’s the Middletown Center, not the Marriott Center.”
The six commercial buildings originally were proposed as one-story, mixed-use structures, but the presentation Thursday identified them as twoto three stories tall with retail shops or restaurants on the ground floor and two drive-thru locations to be used by a food establishment or bank.
The developers also seek to relocate the public bus stop on West Main Road to the interior of the property to help with traffic and extend the bike lane from Coddington Highway down the length of the property on the west side of West Main Road. The plan includes 668 parking spaces total.
Some organizations are in favor of the project, while others are not
While Aquidneck Land Trust still needs more details before giving full endorsem*nt to the project, Executive Director Chuck Allott said the development generally reflects the mixed-use, dense development plans recommended by the Land Trust to help protect Aquidneck Island’s diminishing open space.
“We have to do more innovative, mixed-use, higher-density development which takes pressure off our open space lands,” Allott said. “Conceptually, we think this is the kind of thing that the town of Middletown and other communities on this island need to be doing to take the pressure off the farmland so it can be protected.”
Jennifer Barrera, former director of Lucy’s Hearth homeless shelter and current chief strategy officer for the RI Coalition on Homelessness, told the Planning Board on Thursday while the addition of market-rate homes does generally increase the number of affordable homes in a community as people by freeing up older units, this complex would not contribute to achieving the state-designated 10% affordable housing threshold.
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“We have a responsibility for our very low-income and vulnerable residents, of which we clearly have a lot,” Barrera said. “Additionally, the retail, hotel and restaurants are not going to be places paying a housing wage. A housing wage in Rhode Island is $22 an hour. Find me a hotel staff member, restaurant staff member or someone else working in his complex that will be working and making that housing wage.”
Since the municipally owned land currently features a field of undeveloped open space and a recreation center used by local youth, many at the Planning Board hearing also questioned how replacing the space with a hotel and retail space would benefit the residents.
“Where will our children play if that field is taken away?” former Town Councilor Antone Viverios asked the board on Thursday. “I would urge the committee to look at this very closely, rather than look at the million dollars the town is going to get. I have to ask the question: Is it worth it to the citizens of this town and the children?”
