Oakdale City Council Supports Moving Ahead with Hotel at Oak Marsh

Oakdale City Council members said they support moving ahead with plans to construct a hotel at , in a workshop meeting Tuesday.

“Concept-wise, I think it’s great,” said City Council member Paul Reinke.

With 35,000 to 45,000 guests per year, the proposed hotel should generate about $335,000 in additional rounds of golf and sales in the pro shop, said Brian Burton, chief operating officer for Kansas-based Fairway Suites, a developer that specializes in hotel projects on golf course sites.

“I don’t think it’s any secret that the golf industry has taken a tough turn the past few years,” said Wendell Pittenger, owner of the company that operates Oak Marsh. “Anything we can do to make Oak Marsh a better economic engine and secure its future, I think we should at least consider.”

In addition to extra golfers, Burton said the hotel would also bring more business for the course’s banquet facilities. Pittenger said banquets account for about half of Oak Marsh’s business.

Fairway Suites picks its sites for potential hotels by talking with representatives from Marriott, Hilton and InterContinental and finding golf courses in their target markets with enough land for new hotels, Burton said.

There’s a market for another hotel in the Oak Marsh area, regardless of whether it includes a golf component, Burton said.

“The golf course for us is an amenity, not the driving force of our location,” Burton said. “If our hotel would not stand on that piece of dirt by itself, without the golf course, we wouldn’t do it in the first place.”

The hotel owners pay all the construction costs, and typically cities lease the land to the companies, Burton said.

Oak Marsh Golf Course is on city property, and so the city gets a portion of the business’ revenues.

Council member Stan Karwoski said he likes the idea of a hotel on the course, but he is concerned about how the financial arrangement will work.

The council decided to talk about the financial side of the concept at its June 28 workshop meeting.

Look in the photo section of this article for a map of the Oak Marsh Golf Course site with proposed hotel and additional parking.