Get your Green Book listings in

It’s the October issue, and that means we’re only a few issues away from the end of this year. How can that be? Since I only have a tiny bit of space here since I decided to share it with one of our Hotel Business readers, I want to bring to your attention two matters:

The annual Green Book publishes in December. If you have already submitted this year for one of our surveys, there’s no need to do anything else. If you have not and want your company information to be included in this always-anticipated industry resource, please make sure to take a minute to go to hotelbusiness.com and click on “Surveys” (top right of homepage) and fill out the appropriate one(s). Timing is everything. Our surveys will close in early November.

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To the Editor:
I am a long-time, appreciative subscriber of your magazine. I still enjoy reading it today, even though I am now retired from a 52-year career in hotel and resort management.

I was wondering if you would consider doing a feature on how state and local hotel associations are addressing the issues surrounding the use of so many hotels now being used for all the illegal immigrants being let into our country through our southern border. Being both a legal immigrant myself and a former hotel operations executive, I am intrigued to know how these issues are being handled. Are the hotels supplying a limited amount of housekeeping services? Are any food and beverage outlets being utilized? Are the hotels being adequately maintained?

As an example, from what I understand, the Roosevelt Hotel in Manhattan has been leased for three years by our government from the owners for $220 million of our tax dollars. And this would be just the tip of the iceberg!

I am sure you would not want to get into the politics of it all, but it would be really interesting to know how this is working out strictly from a hotel operations perspective and how local communities are responding. I worked in Scottsdale, AZ, for a number of years and I believe a former Homewood Suites right on Scottsdale Road, not far from
a property I used to manage, was used for this purpose and serviced with a food operation provided by an NGO based in San Antonio, obviously under a government contract.

I realize it’s possible you may have already addressed this topic and I could have missed it, although I look through all the issues I still receive. During the years I spent in Arizona, I served on the boards of both the Arizona Hotel and Motel Association and the Valley Innkeepers Association, which covered properties in the Phoenix metropolitan area. I moved back to Florida in 1976 and served on the board of what was then the Florida Hotel and Motel Association for many years.

Anyway, I feel sure this topic would be a very interesting one and I respectfully submit my comments for your consideration.

– L. William ‘Bill’ Pullen, CHA, author of “It Started at The Savoy,” a memoir covering a 52-year career in hotel management

Editor’s note: Hotel Business welcomes the opinions, perspectives, suggestions and questions from our readers, and encourages feedback and dialogue from our audience of industry professionals. Please share your thoughts about and experiences with this topic presented by Bill, or about any industry issues and concerns. We’d love to explore what’s on your mind.