The Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority agreed Jan. 21 to participate in a $7 million loan for expansion of the Best Western Landing Hotel at Ketchikan.
Board members meeting in Anchorage approved a request from First Bank for AIDEA to purchase $5.6 million of loan, which is 80 percent of the loan.
The funds will be used to refinance existing debt, demolish the hotel's 14-room outer court and replace it with a new wing that includes 45 rooms, a new office and laundry facility, a corner retail outlet and conference/banquet facilities for upward of 200 people.
The two-story facility to be demolished is 9,720 square feet. The new facility will be four stories and contain 35,374 square feet.
AIDEA officials said the owners, Terral F. Wanzer and Kay D. Sims, plan to complete the expansion project by the end of 2005.
Wanzer and Sims, both actively involved in management of The Landing Restaurant, have been business partners since 1979, owning and operating hotels and restaurants in Alaska. They have owned and operated the Gilmore Hotel and Annabelles in Ketchikan, and currently own and operate the Prospector Hotel in Juneau. They purchased the Best Western Landing in 1986.
AIDEA officials noted in their loan summary that the state agency's relationship with Wanzer and Sims dates back to 1993, when AIDEA participated with First Bank in a $2.6 million loan to refinance existing debt and construct a new addition.
There are currently 325 hotel rooms in Ketchikan, spread among six hotels, including the Best Western Landing. AIDEA officials said the Best Western Landing had historically outperformed the other hotels when looking at the average change in citywide room sales from one year to the next.
