Garden Grove : First High-Rise Hotel Should Be Budget Boon

The city’s first high-rise hotel is expected to generate enough tax revenues to finance a 6% increase in the 1986-87 budget and the hiring of more than 15 new employees in various departments.

Controller Anthony Andrade said the $54-million budget will include cash for much-needed street repairs and storm drain improvements and some new equipment to make those repairs. “Right now, it looks pretty good,” Andrade said of the city’s fiscal condition.

Garden Grove has already hired three building inspectors and a supervisor for a planned step-up of building code enforcement, and the new budget includes funds to continue that effort. In addition, the city’s move to become self-insured will require an insurance program administrator and staff.

Other new positions include three firefighter-paramedics, a motorcycle patrol officer and a tree-trimmer.

A recent proposal to sell $30 million in municipal bonds--earmarked for various redevelopment projects--will be accompanied by the hiring of an economic development specialist as soon as the bonds are approved.

The new hotel, the 16-story Plaza Alicante at Harbor Boulevard and Chapman Avenue, is partially open. Joined to a high-rise office building by a 160-foot-high atrium, the project is expected to increase the city’s bed tax income from $490,000 in 1985-86 to $850,000 in 1986-87. Sales tax income is expected to rise about 4% to $11.5 million.