Mention You're a Shaw Resident for Discount at New Hotel

At its regular monthly meeting April 1, Advisory Neighborhood Commission (ANC) 6E/Shaw granted a stipulated liquor license to the soon-to-open 182-room Cambria Suites Hotel (899 O Street NW) located above City Market at O. The full ANC followed the recommendation of the liquor-licensing affairs committee of ANC6E to grant the stipulated license. The vote was unanimous.

And also a hotel for out-to-town visitors

As part of the presentation in support of the request for a stipulated license, attorney Stephen J. O'Brien of the law firm Mallios & O'Brien told ANC6E that Shaw residents will get a discounted rate at the new hotel if they make reservations directly by phone to the hotel after it opens on May 1. O'Brien conceded residents themselves would have little reason for a hotel room for themselves. This discount is aimed at Shaw residents who are hosting out-of-town guests and cannot adequately house them in their tiny inner-city apartments.

The discount will not be advertised on the hotel's web site.

"The community will have to know enough to ask for it," O'Brien said. If the person answering the phone at the hotel doesn't know about the discount, he added, Shaw residents seeking the discount should ask to speak to Francisco Selles, the General Manager, who would make sure the discount was applied.

There may be blackout periods, O'Brien also said.

It was admitted at the meeting that it is impossible to collect or maintain a full list of Shaw residents. So, the discount will operate on the honor system, meaning, anyone calling and claiming to be a Shaw resident would receive the discount.

The Cambria Suites Hotel would be primarily aimed at the business traveller, according to O'Brien. As a result, the operators expected most of the guests to stay between Sunday and Thursday evenings. More rooms will be available on Friday and Saturday nights which, O'Brien hoped, would compliment the needs of local residents who have out-of-town guests coming for the weekend.

The hotel's web site is accepting reservations for check in after May 14.

On-line information says the hotel project represented an investment of over $40 million and created an estimated 300 jobs in the Washington area. The majority of employees are D.C. residents, according to information presented at the meeting, and there are still "a handful of jobs" left. They can be applied for through the company web site, www.concordhotels.com.

Granting a stipulated license is one of the few actions that an ANC can take that is more than advisory in nature. On the basis of ANC6E's action, the hotel will be able to legally serve alcohol until its long-term liquor-license application makes its way through the D.C. liquor-licensing bureaucracy, assuming no other party makes an official objection.

Alcohol will be served in the hotel lobby bar, which will be one level up from the street. There will be a summer garden with alcohol service. It will close at 11pm.

ANC6E videos its meetings and puts the videos on Youtube. Watch the section of this meeting that deals with the Cambria Suites Hotel here, starting at time 11:00.