The Oil City Redevelopment Authority heard an update about plans to demolish the Days Inn hotel in Oil City at the panel’s meeting Wednesday.
The demolition project will go out for bid right around the time of the May 11 auction of the hotel furnishings or shortly afterwards, John Phillips, the president and CEO of the Oil Region Alliance, told the authority.
“There is going to be a lot of heavy equipment coming in and out of there. It is a monster building,” Phillips said.
In other business at Wednesday’s meeting, city manager Mark Schroyer said a contractor who will be working on the Veterans Bridge this summer has asked to rent the back parking lot at the Days Inn for staging.
But Schroyer said he and Phillips are reluctant to allow that with the hotel demolition in the works and other nearby areas available under the bridge for staging.
Schroyer also noted that part of the parking lot at the former Days Inn is being used for parking by city employees and visitors to City Hall.
Part of the plan with the city and ORA’s acquisition of the Days Inn property and demolition of the hotel is also that city employees will have additional parking, Schroyer said.
He asked that in the near future part of the parking lot be subdivided and given to the city for parking. He proposed the two rows closest to McDonald’s.
Once demolition gets underway at the hotel, Schroyer said barriers will probably need placed to separate the parking area for city employees from the construction.
The property is owned by Norfolk Southern Railroad.
“I just inked a contract with a consultant to represent us in negotiations with Norfolk Southern,” Phillips said.
The consultant told him that with everything Norfolk Southern is going through right now, including an attempt at a hostile takeover of the railroad, it will take time to even get the company’s attention regarding the Oil City property, Phillips said.
He added that Norfolk Southern has also closed down many of its property offices, including the one in Harrisburg, going from 13 to two property offices, so all its previous contacts in the state are gone.
Bill Moon told the authority members he went to a tax sale Wednesday morning and acquired several properties on behalf of the Venango County Land Bank.
The deed for two of those properties, 615 East Second St. and 1003 East Second St., will be transferred to the redevelopment authority, Moon said.
The plan is to demolish the two houses with funds supplied by the land bank.
“If it comes up for tax sale it is probably uninhabitable and the area along East Second Street is zoned commercial, not residential, so we acquire it,” Schiller said. “We are not in the business of buying houses that are habitable. We are getting rid of blight,” he added.
