| City to revoke Country Inn and Suites license on July 8; hotel official says he will pay $13,000 in 2008 taxes today |
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Country Inn and Suites in Quincy.
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Published: 6/30/2009 | Updated: 7/7/2009
By EDWARD HUSAR
Herald-Whig Staff Writer
Country Inn and Suites will lose its license to operate as a hotel effective 12:01 a.m. July 8 under a “final order” issued this morning by Mayor John Spring in a case involving the hotel’s failure to pay hotel-motel taxes in 2008.
However, a top official with the hotel said today he plans to seek a hearing with the mayor in an effort to keep the hotel operating without interruption.
Mike Hill, the hotel’s managing member, told The Herald-Whig the hotel still has about $13,000 in interest still to pay in connection with the hotel’s 2008 hotel-motel taxes, and he intends to pay it today. “Everything else has been paid,” he said.
Hill also said he plans to request a hearing before the mayor to demonstrate that the hotel is in compliance.
Spring initially announced the license revocation on June 8 in response to testimony presented at a May 27 hearing at City Hall. In that initial order, Spring concluded the hotel failed to remit $80,655 in hotel-motel taxes collected from guests during the period May through November in 2008. That figure does not include any additional penalties or interest the hotel may owe.
However, Spring gave the hotel’s operators additional time to request a hearing to show whether the hotel has come into compliance by paying its overdue taxes, penalties and other associated fees.
Hill told The Quincy Herald-Whig in mid-June that the hotel had paid $110,939.79 to the city treasurer, claiming it accounts for all the hotel-motel taxes past due except for interest. However, City Attorney Tony Cameron said the hotel’s operators never requested a hearing to a present evidence showing the facility was in compliance.
Consequently, the mayor today issued a “final order” declaring the hotel’s operating license “is hereby revoked, terminated, stricken, set aside and held for naught, effective 12:01 a.m. July 8, 2009,” according to the language in the written order, delivered this morning to Quincy Hotel LLC, the corporation doing business as Country Inn and Suites.
“The mayor waited more than 30 days after the hearing to take this action,” Cameron said in a written press release. “In his first order on June 8, he left the window open for the operator to come into compliance. He was more than patient.”
Cameron said he was disappointed the motel didn’t provide any reason for the mayor to do anything but conclude the case. “This is very disappointing,” he said. “Two weeks ago, we had reason to be hopeful this was a business that could be saved.”
In his press release, Cameron said the issuance of a final order concludes the administrative hearing.
“The hotel is now under an order of revocation,” Cameron said. “If it wants the revocation lifted by the mayor, it will have to file its own petition and prove to the mayor it is in full compliance and will be a responsible operator.”
Cameron said city officials “have had internal discussions about enforcement mechanisms in the event we reached this regrettable point. After the effective date of the revocation, we will be actively enforcing the ban.”
He also said his office and the city treasurer “will continue collection efforts through additional means.”
At a hearing June 11 in Adams County Circuit Court, Quincy Hotel LLC pleaded no contest in connection with a lawsuit brought by the city.
The suit specifically related to $10,890.95 in hotel-motel taxes the hotel collected in May 2008 and which should have been turned over the city treasurer by June 30, 2008. The hotel also has been non-compliant in its payment of hotel-motel taxes for other months in 2008, but the case only related to the May 2008 taxes. The city was seeking up to $156,000 in fines and penalties for that month alone.
Judge Chet Vahle accepted the no contest plea and reduced the fines and penalties to $4,035. The hotel paid this fine on June 17.
— ehusar@whig.com/221-3378
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