The Relax Inn Motel, located on Canada Road at I-40, will be torn down sometime in March by construction company Grinder, Taber & Grinder, Inc.
That will occur after the closing date for the City’s purchase of the property on March 6, 2024. On that date, or possibly the day after, the property will be empty and fenced off and secured according to city officials. However, the official date of demolition cannot be determined yet according to Lakeland City Manager Michael Walker. “Some of the timing is dependent upon MLGW and Shelby County. MLGW is scheduled to disconnect utilities the week of March 11th, and after utilities are disconnected, Grinder will submit a permit with Shelby County to perform the work of demolition,” he told Lakeland Currents. Mr. Walker stressed the Shelby County permit cannot be applied for until utilities are disconnected, and the County permit review is typically around two weeks. Emily Harrell, Lakeland City Engineer, was hopeful for a March date stating, “if all goes according to schedule, Grinder should be able to mobilize by the end of March.”
The contract to demolish the building, including the removal of the tall motel sign in front of the property, was officially approved at last night’s Lakeland Board of Commissioners (BOC) meeting. The work is expected to be completed by April 26, 2024, according to the contract. City documents show the base bid for the project came in at seventy-eight thousand eight hundred dollars ($78,800.00) with an additional bid in the amount of twelve thousand dollars ($12,000.00) to remove the sign. The total cost of the project will cost ninety thousand eight hundred dollars ($90,800.00).
The City of Lakeland is buying the old motel, along with the Econo Lodge motel which has already been removed, after a .15 cent tax increase in June of 2023. Those funds have been used to cover the cost of purchasing the properties and their removal. The old Econo Lodge property will become a Lakeland YMCA by the summer of 2025.
What will become of the Relax Inn property has yet to be determined. The BOC has not yet made any final determinations or decisions according to Mr. Walker, and there are not yet any design or construction plans in place. “The Board has continued to discuss the potential of the City building public facilities that would include space designed to meet the needs of the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office, and those discussions with SCSO are ongoing,” he said.
According to Mr. Walker the next step in the process will be a preconstruction meeting with the demolition company, where the actual demolition dates will be discussed.
