By NEAL WAGNER / Managing Editor

Pelham, Shelby County and state leaders are looking into possibly constructing a large conference center and hotel in Oak Mountain State Park after the Pelham City Council agreed to help fund a feasibility study on the matter during a Jan. 21 meeting.

During the meeting, the council voted to enter into a memorandum of agreement with Shelby County, the county’s Economic and Industrial Development Authority and the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources to move forward with the feasibility study. The Greater Shelby County Chamber of Commerce also is considering contributing to the feasibility study.

The vote came after the council heard from Shelby County Manager Alex Dudchock and Greg Lein, the director of the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources’ State Parks Division, during a pre-meeting work session.

Through the agreement, Pelham, the county and the state agency will contribute up to $25,000 to fund the feasibility study and “if warranted, preliminary design drawings,” read the agreement. SCEIDA will contribute up to $20,000.

Dudchock said the size and location of the proposed facility has not yet been determined, and will be decided after the results of the feasibility study are revealed.

However, Dudchock said “we are not looking at this to be some small project” with only 75-80 hotel rooms and only about 5,000 square-feet of conference space.

“We don’t have the size and scope, because that will be a product of this study. A lot of details are still to come,” Dudchock said. “This will be a full-service hotel and conference center.”

Lein said a hotel and conference center was included in a previous OMSP master plan.

“I think it is very logical given the population and the traffic corridor that goes right through here,” Lein said of the project, noting he was pleased with the collaboration between local, county and state agencies on the feasibility study.

City Council President Rick Hayes said the feasibility study will help to ensure the hotel and conference center, if constructed, is the “right size to host the kind of events we want to have there.”

“This is a fantastic opportunity for the whole region,” Hayes said.