Choice hotel coming to Santaquin

(Daily Herald) Santaquin is hoping to augment its tax base and gear up for growth from a proposed 60,000-acre development in southern Utah County with the construction of a 100-room Choice hotel, three restaurants, a business park and the city's first grocery store.

David Earnshaw, the hotel's developer, will announce today he is in talks with Choice Hotels International to build two Choice hotels, one in Santaquin and one in Salt Lake City.

The brand is most likely Comfort Suites, said Stuart Reid, chief executive of The BARR Co., an Ogden-based consultant to Earnshaw's company, Earnshaw Enterprises, in Salt Lake City.

Construction of the three-story hotel, to be located on a 7-acre parcel at 750 E. Main St. in Santaquin, will start in a few months and is scheduled for completion by next summer.

Earnshaw also is in negotiations with up to two national chain restaurants for the project, which will include a new Maverik gas station, the hotel, three restaurants and 100,000 square feet of office space. The project, which totals 11 acres, is expected to create around 100 jobs. The name of the hotel and restaurants will be formally announced in spring, Reid said.

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