For the second time in two weeks, a major economic development project that will have a vast local and regional impact has broken ground in Cazenovia. This latest event, held Friday morning, May 15, in the Village Edge South area across from the Town and Country plaza on Route 20, was the official dedication ceremony for the new 80-room Hampton Inn and Suites hotel and conference center being built by Cazenovia Hospitality LLC.
“I’m excited after years of planning,” said Dan Kuper, president of Cazenovia Hospitality LLC and owner of The Lincklaen House. “We look forward to getting started.”
The four-story hotel, which was in the works for five years before getting final village approval, will have 80 rooms and a one-story conference facility for 300 people. There will be a pool but no restaurant in the hotel. The exterior of the first floor will be made of brick, and the top three floors will be made of a tannish/grey clapboard.
Construction is expected to take 10 months, with the opening slated for April 2016, Kuper said.
Even though the official dedication was held Friday, construction crews started clearing the ground the previous Monday, May 11, to take advantage of the good weather, said project manager Dave Mehlbaum, of Hueber Breuer Construction Co.
The hotel dedication was attended by local, regional and state officials, local business owners and community members.
The hotel will be “the single greatest economic engine for this part of the county going forward,” said Cazenovia Mayor Kurt Wheeler.
Wheeler, and many other speakers at the event, mentioned that Friday’s ground breaking came only one week after the Empire Brewing Company’s Farmstead Brewery groundbreaking event the week before, on Friday May 8, at the brewery’s Rippleton Road location. “I hope there will be many more,” Wheeler said.
Cazenovia Town Supervisor Bill Zupan agreed that the hotel will be “a great thing for the town and for Madison County,” and he commended Kuper for “his vision and belief in Cazenovia to do this project.”
Kip Hicks, executive director of the Madison County Industrial Development Agency, said the new hotel and conference center will be “a much-needed resource” for the local colleges and universities, the local community and the Cazenovia Beverage Trail. “We’ve just got a lot of momentum going, and it’s good to see New York State contribute and help to bring these projects to fruition.”
Cazenovia Hospitality’s new Hampton Inn and Suites is a $9 million project, part of which will be paid through a $1.28 million grant the company received from the New York State Regional Economic Development Council in December 2014.
Jason Emerson is editor of the Cazenovia Republican. He can be reached at [email protected].
