DANA POINT : Developer Wants to Delay Building Hotel

Officials of the proposed Monarch Beach resort want the City Council to reconsider its requirement that a hotel be developed before homes can be built.

Ben Cagle, general manager of the long-delayed resort, asked the council to permit a delay in construction of a luxury hotel and instead allow 155 homes and a golf clubhouse to go forward on part of a 225-acre property that straddles Pacific Coast Highway about half a mile from the Headlands peninsula.

The council and California Coastal Commission approved the project in 1992 on grounds that its centerpiece, a 400-room hotel, be built first, a restriction that Cagle says has prevented any progress.

“There just isn’t any financing available for hotels these days and no one seems to know when that financing will be available,” Cagle said Tuesday.

Cagle’s request comes a month after the council’s approval of a similar resort plan for the Headlands peninsula near Dana Point Harbor. The Headlands plan also includes a 400-room luxury hotel, but the city did not insist that the hotel be built before the residential portion of the plan.

In its entirety, the Monarch Beach resort plan includes 238 homes and condominiums, a 27-acre city park and an expansion of the 11-year-old Links at Monarch Beach golf course. The project, which has been compared to Monterey Peninsula’s famed Pebble Beach, is owned by Tokyo-based Nippon Shinpan Ltd.

As an added inducement, Cagle has offered to build a temporary public driving range on the site, with all profits going to the city. Most of the design, construction and financing costs would be paid for by Nippon Shinpan.

“We are trying to come up with some kind of proposal that will help the city financially,” Cagle said. “Everybody is stressed these days, particularly this city, with the park district losing its financing. If we can help the city, maybe they will see this our way.”

City Councilman William L. Ossenmacher said he thinks “something can be worked out.”

“I wouldn’t blanketly say yes or no without looking at more details . . . but if both sides get together and talk and work out a win-win deal, something can be done,” Ossenmacher said. “Most people want to be fair. I certainly do.”

The earliest the council could consider the request is Tuesday.