Omaha Hilton Expansion Design Awarded To Dallas Firm

A source alerted us yesterday that they heard through the grapevine that the City of Omaha-owned Hilton expansion Design project was awarded to a firm out of Dallas, TX.

After doing some checking around, I found the contact for this bid’s contact info on this bid (“RFP: Expansion and Renovation to Hilton Omaha – Architectural and Engineering Design Services”).

I called the contact for the bid, Richard Tattersall–who has a Chicago phone number, which is kind of strange–to find out more about this bid.

Tattersall said “this bid has been awarded to RTKL out of Dallas, TX.”

This sounds a lot like the beginning of the whole Hilton mess when it was originally built.

Let me get this straight: we pay a consulting firm from outside the state (HVS) $15,000 to tell us to expand a hotel–again, owned by the City of Omaha, in the middle of a terrible economy where business and convention travel is WAY down–and then hire a architectural firm that is located in Dallas to design it?

Are there really no companies in Omaha that can’t do this? I find that very hard to believe. The cost savings had better have been extremely significant to justify this.

And you wonder why Mayor Suttle’s approval rating is 23%…

Much more on this topic on tomorrow’s show. We are on KOIL AM 1180 from 10-11am or stream us from right here on our website. And we will want your take: (402) 342-1180.