PENDLETON — The Marigold Hotel will remain closed for business.

The Pendleton City Council on Tuesday, Dec. 7, unanimously voted to uphold the city staff’s decision to suspend and revoke The Marigold’s business license following a Nov. 9 shooting at the 105 S.E. Court Ave. building.

The Marigold owner Shivam Patel appealed the city’s decision, giving the city council the opportunity to either affirm the revocation or reverse it. The council held a hearing where both Police Chief Chuck Byram and Patel were allowed to make their cases.

A three-month promise

Patel and his attorney, Matthew Lowe, assured the council the owner would take a much more active role in The Marigold going forward.

Patel told the council he focused on the health of his family at the outset of the pandemic, wanting to protect his chronically ill grandparents.

But with his grandparents moving back to India after their health improved, Patel said he was ready to get hands-on with the business.

Patel said he ended The Marigold’s practice of renting rooms to locals, changed out locks, upgraded the hotel’s security system, hired a new general manager and intended to hire a security guard that would be stationed at the hotel during the late-night hours.

Patel apologized for the trouble his hotel has caused the community and asked for three months to turn around the property.

Lowe said shutting down The Marigold might not improve the situation on the ground.

“I think it’s important to note that having a shutdown property in the center of town like that is not a good look for the hotel,” he said. “People who are engaging in bad conduct will relocate to somewhere else.”

‘His business and my business are clashing’

While Patel and Lowe’s arguments focused on The Marigold’s future, Byram reminded the council of the hotel’s recent past.

He said The Marigold went from an entity that wasn’t even on the police’s radar in 2019 to a business that attracted more than 270 calls for service in 2021. Even if no one called to report a potential crime, Byram said police still patrolled the area regularly the past two years.

While the city declared The Marigold a nuisance property due to the volume of calls it garnered, Byram said it’s not a city law he tries to enforce often.

“It only takes two nuisance nuisances at any location in which to initiate a chronic nuisance ordinance,” he said.” So we’re kind of conservative in using the chronic nuisance ordinance because quite honestly, I could use it on almost every business.”

Byram said one of the main reasons The Marigold continued to attract law enforcement’s attention was because Patel repeatedly hired employees who permitted or were even complicit with the criminal activity at the hotel.

Byram said Steven Enko, the man authorities suspect of shooting a gun from The Marigold and injuring a 17-year-old boy, was the “significant other” of an employee and was being allowed to stay at the hotel unbeknownst to Patel. This differs from an account Lowe submitted to the council, which identified Enko as a person who was visiting a hotel guest. Byram said even after police informed Patel of Enko’s connection to the hotel, he hesitated to believe their account.

“It’s not my job to run his business for him, “ Byram said. “I run a different business, and his business and my business are clashing.”

Patel didn’t receive much public support from the city council audience, either.

Although the hearing itself was not open to audience input, members used the public comment section to share their frustrations with The Marigold.

Tim Guenther, the owner of Prodigal Son Brewery & Pub and the Packard Tavern, commended the city for revoking The Marigold business license. Both of his businesses are in close proximity to The Marigold and his staff’s negative encounters with hotel patrons were numerous enough that sometimes his employees felt unsafe walking to their cars after their shift was over.

Paula Hall, the CEO of the Community Action Program of East Central Oregon, said the nonprofit worked with several hotels to provide temporary shelter to unhoused Pendletonians in the early days of the pandemic.

“We never had any incidents like what was experienced at The Marigold,” she said.

Council sides with city staff

Councilor Carole Innes said she volunteered at The Marigold in conjunction with CAPECO and said it did “a pretty darn good job” while there. Now she feels unsafe going to the nearby Banner Bank ATM at night because of The Marigold’s atmosphere.

“It’s our job as a city council to make sure our citizens feel safe,” she said. “That doesn’t mean that we dismiss downtown business development and growth and having that building empty would be a nightmare. So this is a conundrum, at this point.”

Ultimately, the council voted to uphold the staff’s decision, but it’s not necessarily a permanent end to The Marigold. While the council may have affirmed staff’s decision, city attorney Nancy Kerns told the council that City Manager Robb Corbett could allow The Marigold to reopen once he determines that it no longer represents a threat to public safety.