Mason City council approves amending agreement for hotel portion of River City Renaissance project

MASON CITY — The City Council in Mason City last night approved amending the purchase, sale and development agreement for the hotel portion of the River City Renaissance project.

City Administrator Aaron Burnett says the city needed to update the agreement and the timelines contained within the original document as the developer of the project, formerly known as Gatehouse Mason City but now known as MCCCH or Mason City Convention Center and Hotel LLC, has secured investors.   “The timeline is drawing near, that’s why we’re doing this amendment is to get everything in place for the financing to be closed upon. The developer has worked to get the debt secured, to get the franchise agreement secured, to get the investors secured, and so all of these are coming together.”

Burnett says MCCCH is ready to close on financing in the next 45 days.   “I think that will progress very quickly after that. The contractor is ready to move forward. There’s very few things that should delay it from here. I know that’s been said a few thousand times, but obviously we were in the middle of a pandemic. I’m happy to say that we’re moving forward with the hotel and we’re going to see progress yet early this year.”

The council last night also acknowledged that Henkel Construction had the low bid of $1,648,000 to construct a skywalk between the hotel and Music Man Square. The bid date was originally March 4th but got pushed back to allow officials to better coordinate the skywalk with the hotel project. The council is expected to formally award the bid at their next meeting to allow even more time for coordination.