By Krystal Smalley
ksmalley@wbcowqel.com
Monday marked the grand re-opening of Galion’s Central Hotel Senior Apartments, but for some the occasion was a return home.
Significant renovations at the pre-Civil War building on the public square required residents to vacate their apartments. With the final touches added, those that called the Central Hotel home can do so once again.
“It’s good to be home again,” said Mary Linn, a Central Hotel resident who addressed those assembled for the ribbon cutting Monday morning. “It just feels so great to be home. I love it here and I love Galion. I’m tickled to be here.
“This is a great place to live. Everything is so close; we can go to so many places by just walking there,” Linn said. “It’s just a great place to be. It’s a safe place to live and we’re all glad to call it home.”
The Central Hotel project has not been an easy one, but Columbus-based Ohio Capital Corporation for Housing (OCCH) invested in it in the early 2000s. Fairfield Homes, the property manager, informed OCCH of some structural issues in the basement. At one point, one entire section of the building was gutted internally and three floors had to be redesigned and rebuilt.
“We’ve never ever seen what was occurring here at Central Hotel,” explained Hal Keller, president of OCCH. “Bottom line, the building was unsafe. We had to relocate the residents.”
Keller credited the city and other partners for their help with the project.
“Without the city and other partners we would have had to abandon this. Could you imagine downtown Galion without the Central Hotel?” he asked. “It’s just a critical building.”
“Getting this Uptowne area filled,” commented Mayor Tom O’Leary, “getting the residents who have been here before back is really always been part of the vision of the city’s participation in this.”
O’Leary said they recognized from the start the importance of turning the Central Hotel back to the citizens.
“It’s a building in Uptown Galion, but it’s your home,” O’Leary said to the residents present. “We really never lost sight of that and we wanted to do what we could to make this happen.”
O’Leary also noted that without the city’s over $980,000 in a revolving loan fund, they would not have been able to respond to the OCCH’s request for funding and the building could have become a dilapidated structure or even a parking lot, instead.
“While we’d like to get our money back, we’re much happier to have our residents back,” he said.
Though OCCH quoted a $3 million price to Galion City Council for the project, it actually came in at $5 million. Keller said the city provided $1 million for the project with an additional $1.5 million coming from investors and OCCH footing $2.5 million of the bill.
State Representative Wesley Goodman, who noted that Thomas Edison stayed at the hotel and Alexander Graham Bell did testing work on the telephone there, was on hand to give a commendation from the Ohio House of Representatives to welcome the residents to their new home. Tony Ruscilli of Ruscilli Construction Co., Inc. presented a grand re-opening plaque for the building. The community room was named after Kip Lewis, Director of Construction Management at OCCH, who was instrumental in the project.
Representatives from partner agencies Ohio Housing Finance Agency and LEADS, and Tony DiBlasi, Chief of Asset Management at OCCH, also spoke during grand re-opening.
Central Hotel Senior Apartments are currently leasing apartments. Interested parties should contact 419-462-5950 to schedule an appointment.
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