Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, April 22, 1994                   TAG: 9404220187
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: A7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: SANDRA BROWN KELLY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

HOTEL ROANOKE RATES OUTLINED

That's for a function lasting four to eight hours. Use of the hotel's smallest meeting room costs $100, and a day meeting package that includes lunch, refreshments and use of conference space will cost $44 a person.

"We're not the cheapest; we're not the most expensive," said Brian Wishneff, acting director of the Hotel Roanoke Conference Center Commission. The group met Thursday to agree on guidelines for use of the conference center being built by Roanoke to adjoin the hotel being renovated by by Virginia Tech. The complex is due to open in spring 1995.

Doubletree Hotels Inc., which will manage the complex, needed the rates to quote to prospective users, but the utilization guidelines are still in a "proposal" stage, Wishneff said.

Wishneff said the proposed guidelines and rates have been distributed to the general managers of 23 area hotels for their comments.

Commission members also voted to establish a marketing committee made up of the commission director, the hotel manager, Tech and city representatives, the Roanoke Civic Center manager, the director of the Roanoke Valley Convention and Visitors Bureau Board and the general manager of a major hotel in Roanoke.

The committee will serve as an advisory group to the commission director, who will be Doubletree's contact with the commission.

Contracts were approved for automation controls and fire alarm systems for the hotel and the conference center. Morrison Mechanical/Wallace Day won the controls contract of $213,000, and G.J. Hopkins has the $280,000 contract for the fire alarm system.