The City of Wilmington is working with outside legal defense in a challenge to its recent convention center hotel land sale.
On Tuesday, the city council will consider authorizing $50,000 for the services.
The figure is an initial estimate that could shift in actual dollars, said City Attorney Bill Wolak.
“Depending on where we go, it could be less, it could be more….” Wolak told city council members at a business briefing Monday. “I don’t know how the litigation is going to transpire at this point.”
Late last month, resident Glenn Wells filed a motion alleging that the City of Wilmington’s recently approved sale of land for the development of an Embassy Suites next to the Wilmington Convention Center was in violation of a 2006 consent decree.
That decree, among other things, forbade the city from subsidizing or underwriting such a project. Wells says the city crossed that line with its $578,200 sale price. The site is smaller than an acre and is on the northern riverfront.
Sold to Virginia-based hotel developer Harmony Hospitality in February, the land’s going rate was “substantially less than fair market value,” alleged Wells’ motion.
It cites a city-commissioned appraisal from 2013 that placed the value at $1.32 million, a difference of $742,000.
The city, at the time of the sale, said it set the price fairly and legally, pursuant to a state law that deals with local government assistance in economic development. The $578,280, said the city, reflects the property value in consideration of various positive effects, like jobs, wages paid, and prospective tax revenues in Wilmington, attributable to the 161,719-square-foot hotel.
The Charlotte-based Parker Poe law firm will represent the city, according to the city’s communications office. Wolak on Monday said it’s the same legal team that worked with the city when the 2006 consent decree came about.
Wells, listed in the motion as a “taxpayer,” was also an original plaintiff in that case, as were local hoteliers.
He is represented by attorney E.D. Gaskins Jr. of the Everett Gaskins Hancock firm of Raleigh.
Tuesday’s city council meeting will begin at 6:30 p.m. in Wilmington City Hall, 102 N. Third St.
Past stories:
Another hangup lands in convention center hotel plan
City approves land sale; Embassy Suites to break ground next to convention center in June
City-commissioned appraisal puts much higher value on convention center hotel land
City turns down Hilton’s proposal for new appraisal of convention center hotel land
