UPDATED 1:30 P.M.
Springfield, IL (CAPITOL CITY NOW) – Former Springfield mayor Jim Langfelder took aldermen down Memory Lane Tuesday.
A week after a citizen said the city should have found a more stable owner for the 30-story tower – with an alderman countering that it wasn’t the city’s deal – Langfelder said aldermen should have approved a change at the hotel to include apartments.
“With the city elections only five-and-a-half months away,” said Langfelder, “we engaged Ryan McCrady and the Springfield Sangamon Growth Alliance to depoliticize the project. In March 2023, the Springfield Economic Development Commission approved the project proposal by Tower Capital Group to convert the Wyndham into a Delta by Marriott with 250 hotel rooms and 200 market-rate apartments.
“With the now boarded-up Wyndham hotel and Starbucks,” the ex-mayor continued, “failing to take action in the past was shortsighted and in the long term harmful to downtown.
“To say anything different now is very debatable.”
The troubled hotel is closed indefinitely after a fire and flood, which an insurance company alleges are sabotage.
Springfield city clerk and former alderman Chuck Redpath reacted via a text message to WTAX News:
“The city Council rejected the idea of putting low income housing in the middle of the downtown tourism district, which would’ve absolutely killed tourism in the City of Springfield. The ex mayor should have listened to the city Council and cut this guy off years ago. This developer came to Springfield to flip a piece of property and make a quick profit after he found out that he could not do that. He tried getting money out of the city which, fortunately the city council was smart enough, not to listen to him and now this guy is under FBI investigation for insurance fraud, and should be. Once the new hotel that is being constructed over on ninth Street across from the convention center is completed. The Wyndham property will be worth nothing. It needs to be torn down because the cost of renovations would not be comparable to tearing the building down.”
