Submitted Photo The Lodge at Chautauqua Lake project has been canceled.

An $18 million condominium project will receive financial assistance from the Chautauqua County Industrial Development Agency.

On Tuesday, the IDA board approved a $450,000 Al Tech Revolving Loan Fund at 4% interest for 20 years for The Lodge At Chautauqua Lake project during its regular monthly meeting.

Ben Webb, project developer, said the 27 condominiums will be traditional year-round or fractional ownership. He said Terry Elsemore, Fractional Strategies president, is involved in the project and has experience in the resort real estate industry, including the Tamarack Club at Holiday Valley.

Webb said a “whisper campaign” was conducted between July 2018 and July of this year to discover how much interest there is from potential condominium buyers. He said the goal was to acquire contact information from 800 interested people during the yearlong campaign. When the campaign was finished, Webb said they had acquired contact information from 1,200 people who are interested in the project.

Two weeks ago, Webb said they hosted a launch event with the goal of selling 10% of the condos and when it was finished, they sold 11%. He said the ground breaking will be next spring, with a project construction schedule of 13 months. He added the hope is to be open before Memorial Day, with the overall goal of being open before the Chautauqua Institution season starts.

Carol Rasmussen, IDA business development manager, said the estimated total cost of the project is $18,331,000. She said there will be one through four bedroom condos available to purchase, with the gross sellout value being $21 million.

The board also approved an Al Tech Revolving Loan Fund for Global Environmental Industrial Inc in Dunkirk.

Linda Burns, IDA business development manager, said the company is owned by Kevin Austin and has been located in the county for 20 years. She said the company does environmental industrial work and employees 26 people. She added because of a change in work for GE and an accident that injured four employees, which drove up the business’ workers compensation insurance cost, the business is asking for a working capital loan of $100,000 at 4% interest for five years.

The board also preliminary approved a Payment In Lieu Of Taxes agreement with S. St. George Enterprise Inc. Burns said Steve St. George is looking to expand his Webster Road facility in Fredonia from 20,000 square feet to 40,000 square feet. Burns said the PILOT agreement would be for 10 years and would save the company $167,000. The project would also include a sales tax exemption that will lead to a savings of $42,000. Burns said she doesn’t think the project will involve a mortgage recording tax exemption, but if it does that would be a savings of $7,000.

Because the resolutions are preliminary, IDA staff will now schedule a public hearing and start the State Environmental Quality Review process for the project. Once those have been completed, the resolution will come back to the IDA board for final approval.