The waters behind the TradeWinds Resort on St. Pete Beach were calm on Tuesday afternoon, but things inside of a city meeting about the hotel were a bit different.

  • TradeWinds Resorts wants to build a new hotel
  • Residents worry about stormwater flooding, other issues

“The devil is in the details. The details of that be submitted and agreed to as part of any conditional use,” yelled St. Pete Beach resident Bill Pyle.

TradeWinds CEO Tim Bogott said the company wants to construct the Sugar Sands at TradeWinds Island Resort. It adds more than 200 brand new rooms and a parking garage.

And they want to do it next door to TradeWinds Resort where the Coral Reef Hotel used to be. On Tuesday they got a step closer to making it happen.

“As you know, we had years and years of debating this issue and there’s still a minority group of people that are opposed to anything new," Bogott said. "Thankfully there was a majority, as I think there is amongst the population, that is in favor of change and new development.”

In the meeting, city leaders stressed that Gulf Boulevard is known to flood. It’s why most of them said they wanted to know how the new hotel would affect the stormwater flooding and sewage problems.

“My concern is, my questioning is going to be around my concern for our sewer problems,” said one city leader.

A resident who spoke at the meeting echoed those same feelings. “For our city to allow the sewers to get to this point. It may not be criminal but it’s wrong,” he said.

Hotel officials said they intend to make sure they aren’t apart of the sewage problem. They said they plan to hold their stormwater so it doesn’t get released onto Gulf Boulevard at the same time as everyone else. They also said they plan to upgrade and provide a fix to the existing sewage problem.

“We’re trying to provide a solution to their capacity issue,” Bogott said.

“It’s a beautiful project but the citizens need to be assured that we don’t have raw sewage on Gulf Boulevard,” said Pyle.

In the end this is one step of many to come for this beach hotel project. The next meeting is set for early next month.

The city still has several steps to approve or deny before the Sugar Sands at TradeWinds Island Resorts project can move forward. If approved, developers said the hotel could be completed by mid-2018.