Leonardtown, MD – Leonardtown may be losing its only hotel/motel. The owner of the Executive Inn and Suites has applied for a rezoning that would allow for a conversion of the lodging facility to senior apartments.
The proposed rezoning was heard June 20 by the Leonardtown Planning and Zoning Commission. After four people testified on the request the commission tabled it because the motel owner Neal Patel had not shown up to answer questions.
After the motion to table, Patel and several other men eventually showed up but the board ruled they were too late and would have to come back again when the hearing reconvenes at another meeting. That meeting would have to be re-advertised.
Town Administrator Laschelle McKay told the board that Patel had been unable to sell the business as lodging and was seeking the rezoning in response to that. McKay said Patel had hoped to interest either the town or county in buying the building for senior housing. McKay said the town would not be interested in that.
Planning commission member Jack Candela asked if the sole reason for the rezoning was to increase its potential sale value.
A town resident attending the meeting told The BayNet that there had been offers to buy the facility and continue it as a motel but the offers had been rejected as too low.
The loss of the town’s only hotel/motel was bemoaned by two speakers, gallery owner Jane Rowe and Good Earth health food store owner Valerie Deptula. “I think the loss of the hotel would be detrimental,” Rowe said.
Deptula’s business is right next door. She said, “Not having the hotel would hurt the tourism effort,” She added she also feared that with the rezoning the facility would revert to the way it was before, as the former Relax Inn, which was demolished. That motel was used as temporary housing by social service agencies.
McKay said the rezoning for multi-family housing wouldn’t technically mean acceptance of it as an assisted living facility. Cedar Lane Senior Living President/CEO Beverly Stickles wondered if the motel owners had investigated all of the regulatory requirements to establish an assisted living facility.
The management of the facility was questioned during the hearing, including its reservation system. The business had been a member of the Best Western chain with its reservation system, but that has recently been dropped. It is not known whether that was a voluntary or involuntary action on the owner’s part.
An attendee at the hearing told The BayNet that family members from out of town had been unsuccessful in making reservations at the motel, although it does have an online reservation system.
Comments on the Trip Advisor website vary about experiences staying there. Comments ranged from “Lovely Experience” to “Inexcusably Poor Quality.” Several reviewers criticized the hotel’s breakfast.
A call by The BayNet to the Executive Inn and Suites for Patel’s comments was not returned as this story was being filed.
In other business before the planners, final site plan approval was given for seven apartments on the second and third floor of the former PNC Bank (see picture below). The exterior façade will not be changed. McKay said the town is designating 23 parking spaces in the town lot for residential parking.
Contact Dick Myers at dick.myers@thebaynet.com
