The Middletown Town Council voted 4-3 late Tuesday night to reject all three zoning and comprehensive-plan amendments needed to allow a scaled-back hotel development on the former Navy Lodge site, according to the Middletown Town Council's published meeting recording of the July 14 special meeting. The vote effectively halts, at least for now, a redevelopment effort the town has pursued in various forms since 2011.
The council took up three linked measures on their second reading: an amendment to the town's comprehensive community plan changing the future land-use designation of the property from institutional to limited business/office; a change to the official zoning map reclassifying the land from public to LBA (limited business, traffic sensitive); and a new zoning overlay ordinance, the West Main Coddington Overlay District, covering lots 3 through 7 on Tax Assessors Plat 102 at the corner of West Main Road and Coddington Highway. The town solicitor told the council that all three had to pass for the project to move forward under the existing development agreement — if any failed, "the process ends here." All three failed.
Attorney Girard Galvin, representing developer MCTC LLC, told the council the proposal had been narrowed dramatically from its original form. Where the project once called for a hotel, apartments, retail and municipal space across roughly 15 acres, the current version confines development to lot 7 — the roughly 3.24-acre former Navy Lodge parcel — for a single hotel, with a single ground lease replacing three separate ones. Pottsy Field, the softball field named for Staff Sergeant Christopher Pototts, would remain in its current location and stay zoned public, according to Galvin, while the roughly 6.7 to 8 acres to the north would stay under town control, with a minimum of 20% affordable housing if the town later chooses to develop there.
Galvin and hotel company representatives said the project would generate about $850,000 a year in additional ground-lease and tax revenue, growing over time, and cited a letter from a U.S. Navy commander describing ongoing demand for extended-stay lodging near Naval Station Newport. A council member questioned why that letter carried no signature; a hotel company representative said it had been forwarded by email.
Dozens of residents spoke against the proposal, many repeating objections raised over years of hearings: that the project abandoned the mixed-use "town center" envisioned in a 2021 request for information and the 2014 comprehensive plan, that the town never issued a competitive request for proposals, and that including Pottsy Field in any zoning overlay was inappropriate given its status as a deeded, federally conveyed recreation parcel. Several speakers, including members of the town's Affordable Housing Committee and Citizens Advisory Committee, argued the 20% affordable-housing commitment for the undeveloped northern lots was too vague to support rezoning now.
On the council, Vice President Thomas P. Welch III said he would vote yes, arguing the roughly $785,000 to $850,000 in projected annual revenue could have helped hold down the tax rate and that the hotel site was the same parcel once occupied by the Navy Lodge. Councilor Barbara A. VonVillas said she had reconsidered earlier doubts and now supported the revised plan, saying it preserved Pottsy Field while leaving the town in control of the remaining land. Councilor Christopher M. Logan said he could not support the overlay as written, saying the project had changed too much from its original mixed-use concept and that he would rather see the town sell the parcel outright and seek proposals. Councilor Dennis B. Turano said he wanted the matter tabled and sent back to the planning board with fresh public input rather than approved or denied outright. The council president, closing the discussion, said the panel had split into two camps of "three to three" before his own vote made it four against approval, adding that the project would need to "go back to the drawing board."
With the amendments defeated, the comprehensive-plan and zoning changes required for the hotel project do not take effect, and the development agreement's next step — submission of detailed plans to the town's technical review committee and planning board — does not proceed under the current proposal. The council recording did not indicate a scheduled date for the developer or town staff to return with a revised plan; several councilors suggested the matter would need to restart with new public input or a different disposition of the property, including a possible sale.