photo by: Photo by Eric Ayres

Anand Patel, manager of the Wheeling Inn, speaks before a packed crowd Tuesday during a meeting of Wheeling City Council. Members of city council voted 5-1 to declare the hotel a public nuisance upon a recommendation by the city manager detailing criminal activity at and around the property in recent years.

WHEELING — Members of Wheeling City Council voted before a packed house Tuesday to declare the Wheeling Inn a public nuisance.

A public hearing on the matter is expected to take place in June.

Last month, city council moved to table the vote on a resolution to declare the Wheeling Inn a public nuisance after the hotel manager and advocates of the local homeless community advised city leaders that if the hotel were to close, a number of people living there would be put out onto the street.

Since then, the city administration and members of council, along with the city’s Homeless Liaison Melissa Adams and Project HOPE Director Crystal Bauer have been working to relocate individuals in need of a place to stay while the Wheeling Inn is closed pending the public hearing.

Officials said Roxby Development has assisted in providing a space for those who are being relocated.

Anand Patel, manager of the Wheeling Inn, also said he will make sure those in need are able to get out of the hotel and into a safe place while the public nuisance issue is still pending.

“I’ve known these guys for 10 years,” Patel said. “They’re like family to me. As of today, these senior citizens have to get off of the property, but I will help make sure they have a place to stay.”

Wheeling Mayor Glenn Elliott — who has recused himself from the discussions involving the Wheeling Inn because of his personal relationship with Patel — abstained from voting on the matter. Vice Mayor Chad Thalman cast the only dissenting vote on the resolution to declare the Wheeling Inn — also known as the Knights Inn in Wheeling — a public nuisance.

Thalman acknowledged, however, that the situation at the hotel property needs to be addressed, and the rest of city council agreed, voting 5-1 on the declaration with Thalman dissenting and Elliott abstaining.

“I think most of us would agree that the status of the Knights Inn is not acceptable,” Thalman said. “Something needs to change.”

Thalman expressed concerns as to where people staying at the hotel would go after they are told to leave, and he also questioned whether or not the rate of criminal activity around the property would change if the hotel was simply vacated.

“I suspect that an empty and abandoned motel in an urban environment would bring a whole new set of problems for that block,” Thalman said.

The vice mayor also noted that the last time the city took action to declare a public nuisance, dialogue between the city and representatives of that property – the American Legion Post 89 – had broken down. There also had been a fatal shooting there, Thalman noted. The Legion has since been credited for being transformed into a rehabilitated site that contributes positively to the character of the neighborhood.

City Manager Robert Herron had recommended to city council last month that the Wheeling Inn property at 949 Main St. be declared a public nuisance after Police Chief Shawn Schwertfeger issued a report detailing calls to service and criminal cases stemming from the hotel and surrounding area.

The police data provided in the public nuisance complaint listed several drug arrests that came after an undercover operation last year dubbed “Operation Knighthawk,” as well as theft and destruction of property cases, sexual assault cases, alleged prostitution and multiple overdose deaths at the hotel.

Patel has argued that the police narrative of cases at the site has intentionally inflated numbers that include other incidents that have occurred around the property. This was done to create “optics” and to press city council members to vote on “public perception and not the facts,” Patel asserted.

“It is unfortunate that this Wheeling City Council did not take the time to do their jobs and fully digest the information they were provided by Chief Schwertfeger and examine his officer’s actions and their systematic attempts to cause disturbances at the Wheeling Inn and create a fictitious narrative,” Patel said after the meeting. “Twenty-four of the 35 made-to-cases arrests in 2021 that Chief Schwertfeger provided prior to and during Operation Knighthawk happened off the property and many of those locations were intentionally altered to say ‘949 Main St.’ Four others were called in by staff and the two search warrants took some marijuana off the streets.”

While the hotel cannot keep guests while the public hearing is still pending, the staff members will be permitted to remain on site.

“This Wheeling City Council voted to shut down a business based solely on a manufactured report and that is a terrible precedent to set,” Patel said. “Besides shuttering a business, the only thing this city council accomplished was reaffirming the police chief’s unchecked powers.”

Owners of one neighboring building applauded the city’s action.

“Let’s all be clear — the situation at the Wheeling Inn did not suddenly happen overnight,” said Doug Carl, co-owner of the newly renovated building across the street that houses the Bridge Tavern. “The decline of the Wheeling Inn to the state that it is in today has taken place over years with no visible efforts on behalf of the owners to create improvements or upgrades.”

Several people who have invested into the building across the street at 948 Main St. spoke in favor of the public nuisance declaration, describing the Wheeling Inn as a “drug den” and a “chronic, toxic situation” that has only gotten worse over the years, and is no place for society’s most vulnerable people – homeless and health compromised senior citizens – to live.