Hilton Hotels Corp. will give up management of the Hilton Turtle Bay Golf & Tennis Resort at the end of this month, to be replaced by a Texas-based international management company, Benchmark Hospitality. Hilton checks out
of Turtle BayBy Russ Lynch
rlynch@starbulletin.comHilton would say only that it will leave the management of the 485-room hotel and its 800 acres of resort property at midnight Aug. 31.
New management will be up to the property's owners, New York-based Oaktree Capital Management LLC, Hilton officials said.
Employees at the North Shore hotel were told Friday that management would change and Benchmark would be taking over, sources said.
Eric Gill, financial secretary-treasurer of Hotel Employees & Restaurant Employees Local 5, the union that represents most of the 300 or so employees at the hotel, said today the union expects no disruptions. "The employees are not at risk," since they work for Oaktree, not Hilton, Gill said.
Benchmark Vice President of Sales and Marketing Jack Schmidt issued a statement saying the company is finalizing the details of a contract and anticipates assuming the management at Turtle Bay Sept. 1.
The hotel and golf course are undergoing a $30 million renovation launched by Oaktree.
Benchmark Hospitality describes itself as an international hospitality management company based in The Woodlands, Texas. The 20-year-old company operates luxury resorts, hotels, and conference centers throughout the United States, in Canada, Japan and Thailand.
Its chairman and CEO, Burt Cabanas, was at the Turtle Bay property Friday.
The company that formerly owned the Turtle Bay property, Japan-based Kuilima Resort Co., was sold in 1999 to a partnership of Oaktree Capital and Honolulu firm Bill Mills Development Co. Mills later left the partnership, leaving ownership solely in the hands of Oaktree.