A nine-story, 144-room resort is on deck for Clearwater Beach, with plans that would wipe out the lodging side of the Palm Pavilion Inn while keeping the longtime beachside restaurant in place. The concept would demolish the 30-room inn on the east side of the property and swap it for a taller hotel featuring structured parking, a pool deck and elevated walkways that would link back to the preserved restaurant. The proposal has already begun its journey through city planning and is headed to Clearwater City Council for a public hearing in early June.
According to reporting from the Tampa Bay Times, the property is split into two distinct pieces: a west portion with a 7,895-square-foot beachfront restaurant and an east portion that holds the 30-room inn slated for removal. The outlet notes that the development plan would keep the Bay Esplanade restaurant building intact while replacing the lodging footprint next door with the new hotel.
Who Is Proposing The Project
The City of Clearwater’s planning materials identify the site as 10 and 18 Bay Esplanade and show a proposed City of Clearwater development agreement between MHG Palm Pavilion Hotel, LP and Sixth Flag Planted LLC. That agreement would assign 91 units from Clearwater Beach’s Hotel Density Reserve to the parcel. The same meeting packet notes the project has already been talked through at a council work session and that a second public hearing before City Council is scheduled for June 4, 2026.
Local business coverage shows the property changed hands for about $23 million in a transaction that effectively split the site: Beachside Hospitality Group took ownership of the restaurant parcel, while McKibbon Equities acquired the inn portion, according to Tampa Bay Business & Wealth. That reporting also describes the planned hotel as a nine-level, Mediterranean-inspired resort with parking on the lower floors, amenities and lobby on an elevated level, and guest rooms stacked on the upper stories.
What The Plan Would Keep And Change
On paper, the proposal treats the beachfront restaurant as the keeper and the motel as the expendable add-on. The well-known Palm Pavilion restaurant, now operating as Crabby’s Beachside Pavilion, would stay put even as the later-built motel next door comes down. The Palm Pavilion traces its history back to 1926, and both the owners and developers say that long local legacy factored into the decision to preserve the restaurant building, according to Palm Pavilion.
What’s Next In The Public Process
The City of Clearwater’s public notices and planning pages state that the development agreement will return for a formal public hearing on June 4, 2026, with time set aside for residents to speak and to send written comments beforehand. The city’s public-notice materials list the project parcel IDs, spell out how to submit feedback to planning staff and make the full meeting packet available so people can comb through the details before the hearing.
Legal Implications
In the same council packet, officials have also queued up an item to approve a supplemental retainer for Bolves Law Group related to Bay Esplanade litigation, signaling that there is existing legal scrutiny tied to the property. That line item appears in the same City of Clearwater Legistar materials as the development-agreement request and could influence the timing or conditions that end up attached to any eventual approval.
Whether the resort becomes a new waterfront calling card or just the latest example of Clearwater Beach losing older motel stock will ultimately be decided in the hearing room. Local reporting casts the proposal as part of a broader move toward denser, amenity-heavy hotels along the shoreline, and the business coverage of the sale and design offers a preview of the arguments councilmembers are likely to hear when they weigh the plan.
