July 13, 2013
Rio Nuevo Agrees to Invest $4M Dollars in Downtown Hotel Project
Today the Rio Nuevo District board approved a potential investment of $4.3M to build
a downtown parking garage at the corner of Broadway and Fifth Avenue, behind the Hub and
Playground. Atop the new Rio Nuevo garage would be a new AC Hotel by Marriot. The AC
brand is a popular European hotel chain that was recently purchased by Marriott
(http://www.marriott.com/ac-hotels/travel.mi with the slogan “Feel the City”. Marriot has
selected a few sites to launch the urban brand in the United States: The Gaslight District in
downtown San Diego, downtown Chicago and now downtown Tucson. The property is owned
by Scott Stiteler who made the proposal to the District board along with officials from
Marriot. The hotel would lease parking spaces from Rio Nuevo, creating a return on the
investment, in addition to launching a downtown hotel project.
In other Rio Nuevo business, after a motion by member Alberto Moore, the board unanimously
approved retaining Jonathan Paton as the ongoing legislative liaison for the District, announced a
5% pay raise for the two Rio Nuevo employees, and approved an amendment to the District’s Procurement Code that provides $5,000 of spending authority to the Chairman and the Treasurer.