The Finance and Economic Development Committee voted unanimously to forward two ordinances — 2025-233 and 2025-234 — authorizing applications for the Commonwealth of Virginia’s Tourism Development Financing Program (TDFP) for proposed hotel projects in two Richmond tourism zones.

Matt Welch of the Department of Economic Development and other staff presented the state program and details for the two projects. The TDFP is a state-administered gap-financing program that requires projects to demonstrate a market deficiency and fall within a designated local tourism zone. Welch said the city adopted tourism-zone maps in 2016; both projects fall in a zone that qualifies for the program.

The Roseneath Road project (agenda item 4) is at 1600 Roseneath Road in Scott’s Addition, the site of a former Dairy Bar and a later Tang & Biscuit. The presentation described a mixed development with a separate residential component and a hotel piece only subject to the state program: roughly $40 million in hotel capital investment, a seven-story building with about 95 hotel keys and 8,000 square feet of retail. City staff said the hotel component’s GAAP gap-financing estimate is about $2.9 million.

The second project (agenda item 3), at 921 My Myers Street near Broad and North Arthur Ashe Boulevard, is a hotel-only development with higher scale: staff cited roughly $109 million in capital investment and about 253 rooms, with an estimated GAAP gap-financing need of about $14.3 million and roughly 14,000 square feet of meeting space.

Welch said the city negotiated matching contributions so that for every dollar the city contributes toward the gap financing, the state contributes the same and the developer contributes twice that amount — a structure Welch described as maximizing match and improving the project underwriting. He emphasized that the program requires state underwriting and final approval; the council’s ordinances would be a necessary local step but not the final authorization.

After a public hearing with no speakers, committee members representing the district where the projects are located expressed support. Councilmember Jordan said she believed the projects would not compete with the convention-area incentives. The committee voted to forward both ordinances to full council with recommendations to approve; Miss Lynch, Vice Chair Jones and Chair Robertson recorded “aye.”