Photo by Mike Lamb The Marshall Hotel building, which dates back to the 1920s, has stood vacant on Main Street for many years. The city had opened up the property for potential development, but the building is now destined for demolition after construction work at the neighboring city hall revealed major water damage.

MARSHALL — It wasn’t the end they wanted for a vacant building in the center of downtown. But after recent construction work at Marshall’s city hall uncovered major water damage in the former Marshall Hotel, city staff said fixing it would be a cost too big to support.

“Really, the city has worked hard to figure out what was the best thing to do with the building. We really did want to develop that building. We really did want to keep that building there,” said former city public works director Glenn Olson. “Now, knowing what we do know today, the cost would be much more to a developer than initially we thought.”

Members of the Marshall City Council talked about the former hotel building’s condition at a Tuesday night meeting. In separate votes, the council decided to withdraw a conditional use permit to redevelop the building, and to advertise for bids to tear it down.

“We tried to save it. It didn’t happen,” said council member John DeCramer.

Marshall City Administrator Sharon Hanson said the city hall building committee met in March and April to discuss site reports from the former hotel building.

The former Marshall Hotel building was constructed on Main Street in the 1920s. The building has stood vacant for over a decade, and was even declared a fire hazard by the state fire marshal’s office. The city of Marshall went through the eminent domain process to acquire the property, and had been working with potential developers in hopes that the old hotel could be turned into commercial or office space, or apartments.

But this spring, construction at the city hall site next door to the hotel revealed that water had been getting into both buildings through two window wells in the hotel, Hanson said. The project architect and engineering firm both had concerns, she said.

The hotel building could potentially be saved, Hanson said. “However, the cost to do that may be a factor.” The building committee was recommending that the city demolish the hotel building instead.

“Would those problems or defects have been discoverable before we started construction on City Hall?” asked council member Glenn Bayerkohler.

Olson, who is serving as the city’s representative in the city hall construction project, said the hotel building had been inspected in the past. But the water damage wouldn’t have been visible from inside the hotel. It also helps explain why the southeast wall of city hall had problems with leaks, Olson said.

“And while it may be structurally sufficient, it certainly is not usable for an outside wall for either the city hall wall, nor the hotel wall,” Olson said. “The bricks themselves were deteriorated and falling out.” Siding had also been taken off the hotel wall in the window wells, and most of the wall was rotted away, he said.

Having to tear the hotel building down wasn’t an option the public was going to be happy about, council members said.

“I think the public is going to want to know why we didn’t do something before,” Bayerkohler said. Now the demolition of the hotel building would impact the design and cost of the city hall project, and the city would also have to figure out what to do with the hotel lot.

“It was not fully discoverable prior to this,” Olson said. The damage wasn’t visible until workers started demolishing the city hall wall touching the outside wall.

While it was frustrating to learn of the water damage now, “We’ve known the disrepair of that hotel for years,” said council member Steven Meister.

Community members might hold council members’ feet to the fire over the decision to tear down the hotel now, said council member Russ Labat. “But hopefully in the long run, when they see it developed into something and hopefully into something positive that the downtown businesses and the city of Marshall can be proud of, then we can wipe that egg off our face,” he said.