Hotel for Victims of AIDS to Close; Has Just 1 Guest

PALM SPRINGS —  Citing financial problems and lack of response to a facility that he describes as “a little ahead of its time,” Fred Hardt says he will shut down his 3-month-old hotel for victims of acquired immune deficiency syndrome and offer it for sale.

Hardt says the Hardtline Residence Resort Project’s sole guest is still living there “and we’ll take care of him for as long as he needs, but I’m not accepting any others for the time being. The actual property I have listed (for sale).”

Hardt, however, says he is not giving up on the concept of a residence for victims of AIDS.

“In the future, when there are 20,000 to 30,000 (cases nationally) a facility of this nature will be needed,” he said.

But the clientele apparently does not exist right now, he said. The hotel, believed to be the nation’s only privately owned facility for AIDS patients, could have accommodated up to 17 guests.

Trace Percy, coordinator of the nonprofit Desert AIDS Project, said Hardt’s project was uneconomical from the start.

“Those who could afford Fred’s concept didn’t need it and those who needed it couldn’t afford it,” Percy said. Including three meals a day and hotel-sponsored activities, a private room in the hotel cost $975 a month and a semi-private room $750.

AIDS renders the body’s immune system helpless against disease. Homosexuals, Haitians, abusers of injectable drugs and hemophiliacs are frequent victims of the often-fatal ailment.

The disease is spread by sexual contact, contaminated needles and blood transfusions, not by casual contact, experts believe. As of Jan. 14, AIDS had struck 7,857 people and claimed 3,737 lives since 1979 in the United States, the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta said.