PORT ANGELES — A hotel owner who hotly opposes the proposed Oak Street hotel and conference center now says he’ll pay to have a consultant do a new study of the project.
Best Western Olympic Lodge owner Tod McClaskey is convinced the market analysis will show city officials that the project is a bad idea and will fail.
McClaskey indicated that in return for paying for the study, he expected city officials to agree to cancel the project if the results were negative.
Tim Smith, the city’s economic development director, said he would be happy to have McClaskey conduct any studies he wants of the project — but not in association with the city.
“Will we look at it?” said Smith. “Sure. Will we be bound by it? No.”
The conference center’s developer, Randal Jay Ehm, says McClaskey simply wants to do whatever he can to slow down or derail the project because of fears a new hotel will draw guests away from the Olympic Lodge.
McClaskey’s efforts are clearly “a vendetta against someone who can make this project work,” Ehm said in a telephone interview Tuesday.
“I don’t think anyone believes his stories anymore,” Ehm told the PDN. “He is just protecting his own pocketbook.”
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