AUBURN — A plan to let city golf courses, ski areas and similar recreation areas develop resort-like amenities died in City Council chambers Monday night.

Councilors killed an ordinance that would have created a process for recreation areas to create plans for hotels and restaurants on their property. The decision came after more than 40 minutes of public hearing testimony from neighbors of Martindale Golf Club worried about plans for a hotel in their neighborhood.

“I move that this action not be moved forward, that it ends tonight,” said Councilor Tizz Crowley. She called for the mayor and council create a committee to consider similar ideas as part of a larger recreation master plan.

The rule change would have have let developers apply to create Planned Unit Development for Recreation and Residential uses on top of existing zoning codes anywhere in the city, including residential areas and the city’s Agriculture zone.

That could have allowed them to build hotels, shops, restaurants and other resort-like developments associated with their operation in residential areas — with city approval.

Martindale Golf Club owner Jim Day told councilors there was no specific proposal in mind, but he hoped there would be — some day.

Day said he hired consultant Jim McPhee last summer to draft the rule change, hoping to begin working with a hotel after it was adopted.

“If I’m developing it myself, it would be easy for me to go to the planning board and go forward to the community,” he said. “But if I’m out there in the market place, looking for partners to develop a project, they want to know that it can at least come forward to the city and not learn that it’s not allowed right now. There is no way I could hold their interest for the 11 months its taken to get this far in the process.”

Day said Martindale may have to depend on that kind of development to survive as a golf club.

“You have to understand, the old model is broken,” he said. “(The previous owners) lost $500,000 the year before I bought it. The buildings, the investments needed will take a lot of money and thinking outside the box to keep it special. That’s what I’m trying to do here.”

But Martindale neighbors say they were worried that building a hotel would reduce their property values make their residential neighborhood too busy.

Michelle Jacobus of 564 Beech Hill Road contradicted Day, saying that his plans for a hotel development were more concrete than he said. She said she was told by neighbors in October that he had plans to build an 80-unit hotel.

“From the beginning, it appears the developer has done an end-run around the neighbors trying to keep us uninformed,” she said.

Councilors voted 5-2 to table the item permanently, with Councilors Robert Hayes and Leroy Walker voting against tabling.

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