The final resolution is in on a hotel and convention center project that could change the skyline and profile of downtown Kissimmee by the time it’s all completed in 2029.
It’s impressive.
Tuesday night, the Kissimmee City Commission gave its final approval on a Master Development Agreement with Azure Hotel International to build a 300-room hotel and new convention center on the site of the current Kissimmee Civic Center.
In July, Azure was selected to deliver an eight or nine-story hotel tower with 200-250 rooms and a completely rebuilt 25,000 to 35,000 square foot convention center, depending on the size of the hotel.
Tuesday’s agreement ups those stats. Azure will deliver a 300-room hotel on the site of the current Kissimmee Civic Center, built in 1992 and long outlived its usefulness, and a 45,000-square foot convention center on what is now the civic center’s parking lot. The first floor of the hotel building would be parking, and the adjacent SunRail station three-story parking garage would remain in place.
It all makes for a total investment of $183.8 million, with built-in contingencies, city documents show.
The project would create as many as 400 temporary construction jobs — part of the city’s agreement with Azure is to hire a number of local contractors — and 150-200 permanent hospitality positions.
Rather than retaining the ownership of the convention center and paying Azure a management fee to operate it, the sides have agreed on an annual lease payment of at least $2.5 million, ensuring the city will recoup a $10 million investment it had already budgeted for upgrading the civic center.
“At the end of the day we’ll have no debt on this,” Mayor Jackie Espinosa said. “Like Commissioner (Carlos) Alvarez said during this process, ‘Let’s go big or go home.’ That will live with me forever. We took it very literally.”
The city will also receive 5% of the hotel’s revenue – Azure officials during the approval process said the average room rate will be about $175 per night.
The hotel will feature restaurants, a rooftop pool and bar, spa facilities, retail space, and shuttle service to Kissimmee and Orlando’s airports, and it will be immediately adjacent to the SunRail line.
If construction begins on-time in 2026, the convention center could be delivered in late 2028 and the hotel completed in 2029, Azure officials said.
This is one of three projects planned to bring 570 hotel rooms and condominiums to the area, including a project just blocks from the current Civic Center at Toho Square, and a hotel and mixed use project that’s already broken ground across from Kissimmee Gateway Airport on Martin Luther King Boulevard.
“This is the beginning of a very successful chapter for our downtown,” said Espinosa, who owns a number of downtown businesses. “We are determining the face of downtown Kissimmee.”
The plan is bigger, more financially robust and fits the city’s needs more than what Azure and a competitor came to the table with in May. Three months later, the result is a plan a number of commissioners are raving about.
“We made a request, put out requirements, and our partner showed up with exactly what we asked for,” Commissioner Janette Martinez said. “Not only that, it allows our small businesses to be on a list to financially grow through this.”
Commissioner Angela Eady shared excitement about making downtown Kissimmee its own convention destination.
“To see this vision come to fruition, soon … excited is an understatement,” she said. “What we have now is what we have, and it worked. Now, it’s time to go to the next level, and this is the true definition of that, what will take us to that level. We made a request and (Azure) honored it, top notch. I can’t wait to stand on that sidewalk (when the project is built) and know we had a hand in this.”
