For CT city, fresh hope: New 142-room hotel as part of harborfront mega-development
Nearly four years after the only
hotel in Connecticut’s biggest city shut down, developers broke ground on a
142-room Marriott Residence Inn as the latest phase of the ambitious Steelpointe Harbor project on
Bridgeport’s waterfront.
As steelworkers and carpenters worked on part of the
420-unit apartment complex under construction nearby, business leaders gathered
on a vacant lot where True
North Hotel Group and RCI Group plan
to build the six-story hotel over the 15 months.
“Bringing a brand like Marriott is fitting. Only the best
for Bridgeport,” said
Bobby Christoph Jr., the chief developer of Steelpointe Harbor and
president of RCI Group.
The more than 1,000 apartments planned on the
2.8-million-square-foot Steelpointe peninsula are the heart of the mixed-use
project, a decade-old initiative to revive a largely ignored stretch of the
state’s poorest city. New restaurants, stores, a busy boatworks and a marina
are also key components, but the hotel long seemed to most aspirational.
Downtown Bridgeport was home to several once-proud hotels
from its industrial heyday, but they’d mostly been abandoned, razed or turned
into low-income apartments between the 1950s and 1980s. The only new initiative
was a nine-story Holiday Inn that was erected in the 1980s; officials at the
time portrayed it as the key to an economic turnarouned for the city.
But its revenue slumped as the wider downtown revival never
panned out, and the Holiday Inn was already marginal by the time the pandemic
hit. The hotel shut down in early 2022 and has been remodeled as apartments.
“With the harbor and the marina here, it’s a natural fit to
have a hotel. The low-hanging fruit for us is that the largest city in
Connecticut didn’t have a hotel,” said Dan Onofrio, president of the Bridgeport
Regional Business Council.
The hotel developers are expecting roughly 30% of guests
will want extended stays, ranging from families of patients at the St.
Vincent’s or Bridgeport hospitals, parents of students at Fairfield University
or other colleges, and business travelers working with MT Bank or other
prominent employers.
“With the ampitheater there are thousands of people coming
every summer to music shows, you have the Klein Memorial theatre, the Downtown
Cabaret. People don’t realize the breadth of the arts sector here. And don’t
forget, we have the state’s only zoo, the Beardsley.”
The Residence Inn groundbreaking comes 10 years after the
sprawling Steelpointe project kicked off with the opening of a
150,000-square-foot Bass Pro Shops outlet. It has added a Chipotle, Starbucks
and T Mobile, and Mobil plans a large gas station with car wash.
More retail is expected as part of the influx of new
apartments, which are chiefly billed as waterview units leasing at market
rates. The August will open
with about 420 studio, one- and two-bedroom units are expected in the first
wave, with a small number of three-bedroom models. At least 600 more are
planned in future stages.
Renderings show an outdoor pool, pickleball courts and a
large landscaped deck, all overlooking the Long Island Sound. There will also
be a fitness center and yoga studio, along with two outdoor courtyards.
The first apartments are expected to open in January, and
the hotel completion is scheduled for early 2027.
Kosta Diamantis guilty on all charges
Andrew Brown and Dave Altimari
Konstantinos Diamantis, Connecticut’s former deputy budget
director, was found guilty on Wednesday of using his position overseeing the
state’s school construction office to enrich himself and his family.
After deliberating for about a day and a half, 12 federal
jurors found Diamantis, 69, guilty of 21 counts
of bribery, extortion, conspiracy and lying to federal investigators.
“It was a clean sweep. I thought it was going to go my way,
but obviously it didn’t,” Diamantis said outside the courtroom. “The jury
clearly believed them and not me.”
Norm Pattis, Diamantis’ attorney, told reporters outside the
courthouse that his client could face more than a decade behind bars, based on
the federal sentencing guidelines.
“He is facing a catastrophic sentence of 10 to 12 years,”
Pattis said, adding that he could appeal the verdict.
Bottom of Form
Diamantis will remain free on bond until his sentencing
hearing, which is set for Jan. 14.
Diamantis left the court building without further addressing
reporters and drove off in a white pickup truck with his daughter.
Federal prosecutors told the judge that remaining out of
prison would allow Diamantis to meet with his defense attorney in preparation
for a second federal bribery trial, which is currently expected to start in
February.
They also told U.S. District Judge Stefan Underhill that
they recently learned, by monitoring unspecified communications, that Diamantis
was attempting to obtain a Greek passport.
Underhill asked Diamantis to explain if that was true, and
he told the judge that he had recently obtained dual citizenship in Greece and
a Greek passport. But he said he applied for the passport to claim a piece of
property in Greece that his father had inherited.
He also told the judge that his passport was sent to Greece
to facilitate that property transfer.
Prosecutors did not answer questions as they left the
courthouse.
The verdict was returned almost four
years to the day after the federal grand jury issued a subpoena for all emails, text messages and
attachments involving Diamantis and a broad range of construction projects
Gov. Ned Lamont released a statement after the verdict.
“Public service is a public trust. The conviction of Mr.
Diamantis is a stark reminder that when that trust is violated, there are
consequences. Our state places a great deal of trust in our government and that
trust is harmed by rogue, bad actors like this,” the statement reads. “After
immediately firing Kosta in 2021, I ordered actionable steps be swiftly taken
to ensure this can never happen again. After returning school construction
oversight back to the Department of Administrative Services, several proactive
steps were taken to ensure accountability and restore public trust in the
administration of school construction grants.”
The jury delivered its verdict after a nine-day trial,
during which federal prosecutors presented a mountain of evidence that showed
Diamantis negotiated payments from Acranom Masonry and a $45-per-hour job for
his daughter with Construction Advocacy Professionals.
Several witnesses told the jury that Diamantis used his
influence at the state’s school building office to help those companies win
lucrative construction contracts on several projects in Tolland,
Hartford and New Britain.
Diamantis, who chose to testify in his own defense, admitted
to the jury that he accepted tens of thousands of dollars from
Acranom, and he acknowledged that his daughter, Anastasia, was hired by
Construction Advocacy Professionals after consulting with him.
But Diamantis, who once held one of the highest-ranking
positions in the state government, was adamant during the trial that he never
used his public office to help the two companies gain an upper hand on school
construction projects.
By Diamantis’ telling, the tens of thousands of dollars in
cash that Acranom’s executives paid to him was for an introduction to another
firm: D’Amato Construction. And the paychecks and bonuses that were paid to his
daughter had nothing to do with his position overseeing the state’s school
building program.
That testimony was contradicted during the trial, however,
by three separate witnesses who have previously
pleaded guilty to bribing Diamantis in return for work on school
construction projects.
Sal Monarca and John Duffy, the president and vice president
of Acranom Masonry, told the jury how they delivered envelopes of cash to
Diamantis at his home, at a Dunkin’ Donuts and several times at the Capital
Grille in Hartford.
Antonietta DiBenedetto Roy, the owner of Construction
Advocacy Professionals, also explained to jurors how she
chose to pay Diamantis’ daughter to keep him happy.
Federal prosecutors bolstered the testimony of those three
witnesses with a large number of text messages, emails and one colorful
voicemail, in which Diamantis discussed a bid that Acranom submitted for a
school project and the $40,000 he was demanding from the company.
“I didn’t ask for the maximum. I asked for the minimum of
what we bid,” Diamantis told Duffy in that voicemail. “So. That’s more than
reasonable. I even asked for less than that. I asked for forty.”
The long list of text messages that jurors were shown
included memorable details about how Duffy and Monarca referred to the bribes
to Diamantis as “pints” and “birthday cards.” The texts also included several
examples where Diamantis directly intervened in school projects on behalf of
Acranom and Construction Advocacy Professionals.
“The defendant had his thumb on the scale for Acranom,
because that is what Acranom paid for,” Assistant U.S. Attorney David Novick,
told the jury during the closing arguments.
The federal prosecutors also featured text messages in which
Diamantis threatened to remove the contractors from the local school projects
if he didn’t receive the money they promised him.
“I will wait til Monday for him to give you 40. If not, then
I think D’Amato needs a new mason for Tolland then he will see how real the job
was,” Diamantis said, referring to the Birch Grove project where Acranom was
working.
The evidence and testimony presented during the trial also
highlighted for jurors how Diamantis forced the contractors to change how much
they were bidding on the school contracts in order to factor his bribes.
“Doesn’t matter end of day you gone add 70,” Diamantis told
Acranom.
There was far less documentary evidence presented at trial
about the payments that Construction Advocacy Professionals paid to Diamantis
and his daughter. But the records that did exist were highly damaging to the
defense.
While he was on the witness stand, Diamantis claimed he did
not have a hand in negotiating the compensation that his daughter received from
the company.
But text messages between Diamantis and his daughter showed
otherwise. In one exchange, Diamantis told his daughter that she would receive
a percentage of the money that Construction Advocacy Professionals had been
awarded for a school construction project.
“You happy,” Diamantis asked his daughter.
“Yes of course! I can pay my car taxes and a credit card!”
she responded.
The three contractors who bribed Diamantis told the jury he
demanded money on a monthly or weekly basis and made his situation seem
desperate.
Diamantis complained in the texts and the voicemail about
not having enough money to pay his mortgage or to afford his daughters’ wedding
and private school tuition.
In one text exchange, Acranom officials said Diamantis
wanted to collect an “annual fee” from the company for serving as a consultant.
Diamantis admitted that he told Acranom’s executives that.
But he told jurors that it was a “tongue in cheek” comment. He said the same of
several other texts that he couldn’t readily explain.
Massive CT office complex foreclosure lends no easy answers for future redevelopment.
The redevelopment challenge is seen as “really immense,”
The court-approved foreclosure
of a majority of Hartford’s Constitution Plaza is expected to open up
options for the future, but just how redevelopment unfolds — or over what
period of time — is the next chapter in the plaza’s long struggle to find a
niche in the half century since it was built.
“Constitution Plaza represents both great challenge in the
present time but also potentially a great opportunity for the city,” Hartford
Mayor Arunan
Arulampalam said, ‘to be able to stitch together parts of the downtown
that are disconnected, reaching from Front Street on one end to a block away
from Pratt Street on the other end, but also connect the downtown to the
riverfront, which is an exciting possibility.”
“But at the same time, getting there, the challenge is
really immense,” Arulampalam said.
Building a cohesive, redevelopment plan for the 7-acre
property is seen as essential, but won’t be easy given the multiple owners with
interests in the plaza.
The foreclosure, approved
Monday by Hartford Superior Court Judge Claudia A. Baio, involves six
buildings of about 671,000 square feet — including the two office towers at One
and 100 Constitution Plaza — parking garages with 1,743 spaces and the
pedestrian surface of the plaza. The foreclosure also included part ownership
of the pedestrian bridge the connects the plaza to Nassau Financial Group’s
iconic “Boat
Building.”
In addition, there are separate owners for the Spectra
Plaza apartments converted a decade ago from a former hotel; the former
Travelers Education Center, also
considered for apartments, but remains vacant, and the former site of
demolished WFSB studios, now a
vacant lot for sale.
Constitution Plaza, the first redevelopment in Hartford from
the Urban Renewal push of the 1950s and 1960s, failed, some say, to reach its
potential because initial plans for apartments were later dropped and a planned
connection to Main Street was never constructed.
The Capital Region Development Authority said it also has been approached with preliminary plans to use some of the office space on Constitution Plaza for hotel rooms. The city lost hotel rooms in the pandemic when travel — especially business travel plummeted — and scores of rooms were converted to apartments. More hotel rooms are now needed in the rebuilding and further growth of the city’s convention, sports and concert businesses.
Public financing for such conversions is likely to be
seen as essential, but competition for those dollars also is likely to be
intense.
A
recent study showed that an estimated $450 million in public financing
would be needed over three years to convert prime office space for other uses
across downtown Hartford to rein in vacancies, estimated to be at least 40%.
Constitution Plaza also has been mentioned as a location for
a $100
million practice facility for the WNBA’s Connecticut Sun, should the
franchise move to Hartford from Mohegan Sun.
In addition, there is the potential for a temporary location
for the applied
artificial intelligence center that the Arulampalam administration
hopes to establish in the city. A permanent location has been identified just
east of Dunkin’
Park, the city’s minor league ballpark, where a vacant, decaying data
center would be demolished.
Monday’s court ruling approved a strict foreclosure for the
structures purchased by New York-based Constitution Plaza Holding LLC in 2015
for $71 million. A strict foreclosure means the lender or creditor takes
control of the property without an auction to raise money to satisfy a debt.
The property — under the day-to-day control of a receiver
for more than a year — is expected to be transferred to the new owner — a group
of bondholders — in late December, according to court documents.
The foreclosure was set into motion last year when
Constitution Plaza Holding was unable to pay off, refinance or secure an
extension on $51 million that was owed to lenders, court documents show.
According to an appraisal filed with court documents, what was owed was nearly
four times the $13 million the property is now worth. The loan matured in May,
2023, court documents show.
A shift to remote work in the pandemic and the resulting
downsizing in the leases of major tenants pushed up vacancies not only in
Hartford but across the country. Lenders are unwilling to take the risk to
refinance commercial mortgages on office buildings, uncertain of the prospects
for future leasing.
Other major office towers in Hartford — CityPlace I, Metro
Center and 20 Church St., the “Stilts Building” — found themselves in a similar
refinancing predicament, sliding into foreclosure and receivership.
Wilmington Trust National Association and its special
servicer, LNR Partners LLC, filed for foreclosure on the Constitution Plaza
properties in January, 2024. Wilmington Trust was the lead holder of $55
million in commercial mortgage-backed security loans issued to Constitution
Plaza Holding in 2018.
According to the appraisal report, prepared by commercial
real estate services firm CBRE, the office occupancy in the six buildings
involved in the foreclosure at Constitution Plaza is about 70%.
But the report also warned at the major tenants such as law
firm Shipman & Goodwin and
insurer XL America were
likely to downsize their space requirements — now about 100,000 square feet
each — once their leases expire in 2026 and 2027.