SUIT AGAINST CITY COULD BE DROPPED

A long-standing dispute over the city's motel and restaurant tax apparently will be resolved as part of a parks and recreation proposal approved recently by the Cape Girardeau City Council.

The council last month gave initial approval to a $4 million project that will expand parks and recreation facilities in Shawnee Park and at the corner of Mount Auburn and Kingshighway.

One of the proponents of the project, Bob Hahn of Mid-America Hotels, claimed earlier this year that the company would drop its long-standing lawsuit against the city if the proposal was approved. Hahn repeated the pledge at the council's Nov. 16 meeting.

"I made that commitment at the council meeting for the Mid-America Hotels Corp., assuming the project came together as it was proposed," he said Thursday.

"I think as soon as all the wheels are in motion, and basically the bonds are sold and planning is begun, then the attorneys will have to sit down and determine how to handle the legal aspects of dropping the lawsuit."

Less than a year after the hotel and restaurant tax was approved in 1984, the hotel company began to pay their taxes under protest.

Cape Girardeau businessman Robert Drury and his brother, Jim Drury, have filed several lawsuits against the city claiming the motel and restaurant tax violates the city's charter form of government.

In 1985 the Drurys won their case in the Circuit Court in Cape Girardeau County, but the decision was overruled the following year by the Missouri Supreme Court.

Since then city officials and the businessmen involved in the dispute have continued to meet to try to iron out their differences.

Apparently the park and recreation proposal will succeed where past efforts have failed.

Jim Grebing, chairman of the city's Parks and Recreation Advisory Board, spearheaded efforts to combine a park board recreation project with one proposed by Hahn on behalf of Mid-America Hotels.

He said Thursday that the lawsuit had no bearing on the drafting of the final proposal. The taxes paid under protest and held in escrow represent about $300,000 of the $3.5 million to be generated through bonds.

"Our task as the park board was to work with the Mid-America proposal and merge it with the park board proposal," Grebing said. "That's what we did."

Hahn said that "at no point" was the offer to resolve the lawsuits used as "leverage" against the city to assure acceptance of the recreation project.

"We were putting together the best package that would make the best use of the money," he said.

Grebing said a multipurpose building in the Mid-America proposal for the Mount Auburn and Kingshighway tract is something the city has needed for a long time.

"On the other hand, to have the money to fund the whole project, it's obviously important that the lawsuit be dropped for us to have the bonding capability," he said.

City Manager J. Ronald Fischer said the financing for the project is based on the bonding capabilities of excess tourism funds, including those held in escrow as a result of the lawsuits.

"The only way we can generate enough money and make the payments is if that lawsuit is settled," Fischer said.

The city manager said the taxes held in escrow amount to about $130,000, and about $30,000 annually until the sunset of the tax in 2004.

Grebing said it was understood during negotiations to put the proposal together that the escrow funds needed to be released to help finance the project.

"That was made very clear in all our conversations, and there's no doubt in my mind or anybody's that it was understood," he said.

Grebing said the issue will have to be worked out between city officials and Mid-America attorneys. But he said he's confident the matter will be resolved.

"I'm satisfied, based on my conversations with Bob Hahn, that the lawsuit's going to be settled," he said.