Onondaga County proposes to build new hotel in Syracuse

SYRACUSE, N.Y. (WSYR-TV) — The need for more hotel rooms continues to grow in Syracuse with the Sheraton now closed, and soon, The Crowne Plaza. But the county executive says he has plans to help fill the gap.

A county owned parking lot across from the Everson Museum could soon be home to Syracuse’s newest hotel.

“We’re going to be putting out an RFP to the private sector to build a convention center hotel on this lot,” said Ryan McMahon, Onondaga County Executive.

The proposal will be sent out to different developers across the state and the country within the next 60 days. The goal is to turn the property into a full-service hotel, that will offer 200 plus rooms, with the goal of making this the city’s second hotel choice.

“The Hotel Syracuse now the Downtown Marriott is a jewel in our community and helps fill that void but due to the lack of inventory its very difficult for our convention center to book out any business,” said McMahon.

The county executive says that this new hotel will help meet the city’s need for more lodging, while also bringing in convention business.

“Some of the hotel owners will tell you that they get larger room rates and so therefore, them wanting to block out hundreds of rooms at a discounting rate is not necessarily in their interest, and that’s hurting convention business and that’s going to hurt convention business moving forward,” said McMahon. “By putting this county own lot out to the market place for a convention center hotel, we will now have two we can work with to try and accomplish that goal,” said McMahon.

This hotel may be the key to bringing back major events to the city, as it was locked out because of a lack of hotel rooms.

“Micron themselves are going to be bringing 50,000 hotel room nights to the community just themselves,” said McMahon. “Let alone we haven’t even started to talk about the supply chain eco system were recruiting that’s international.”

McMahon also said the city would still need thousands of rooms to hold an event like the NCAA tournament. But this is a step in the right direction.

McMahon says once a deal is made, the county would like for the process to start right away.

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