It’s official, Holiday Inn Express expects to open late spring 2015

Although ground work has been underway for a couple of weeks, Holiday Inn Express gave a positive vision for Pahrump’s economy as the official groundbreaking took place yesterday morning.

Part-owner Jeff Burgess is excited. “We’ve been looking at doing this for two years. Finding a good, ideal location took some extra time. Partnering with Golden Gaming, I think, ended up being the best decision for us,” he said. Golden Gaming is leasing the land adjoining Gold Town Casino to the franchise owners.

The permitting process is not yet complete, however, applications for the project were submitted before the impact fee moratorium was lifted in January, making it less expensive for the project to be constructed.

Burgess said, “We have the grading permit completed and we’ve got the final plans sent back in for review. We had to make a couple of modifications per Holiday Inn Express. We are not as far along as we hoped to be with the building plans, but with a month of site work to do, I think it’s realistic that we’ll be ready by the time we’re done with the site,” he said.

Wulfenstein Construction is responsible for the ground work and the concrete contractor is Pahrump Concrete. Floyd’s Construction is installing the utilities.

Burgess said, “Most of the bid process has taken place as far as the construction. The general contractor is based in southern Utah. There are some local contractors including a couple from Las Vegas. They might still be looking for a couple of contracts.”

General contractor Dave Holmes said the company has not gotten bids for HVAC services. “We were talking with Desmoni Plumbing for the plumbing work but other than Desmoni, no one else has come forward wanting to bid the plumbing.”

When completed, the motel will add 103 rooms to the town’s ability to house visitors to local events and more projects like it may help bring the possibility of professional rodeos back, a concern of Town Board Chairman Bill Dolan, who was present for the groundbreaking.

He said, “Once this project is completed, the town can accommodate more visitors. Many people want the big rodeos to come back to town. We were short of rooms to be able to pull the Westerns Finals Rodeo down here from Ogden, Utah. We will be going back to see if they still want to bring their finals to Pahrump. Overall, the economic development to bring people into town and have more rooms to stay in is exactly what we need,” he said.

The 60,000-square-foot, three-story facility will have an outdoor pool and spa and a fitness center. It is expected to open in late spring of 2015 and offer 25 to 30 jobs to valley residents.