What is at stake is the future of the convention center PatrickMoscaritolo, president of the Greater Boston Convention &Visitors Bureau, tells GlobeSt.com. "We need the hotel for theconvention center to succeed," he says. "Symbolically, to show thatwe can get this done and practicall,y to show conventions thatthere is a hotel here for their people." The 1,120-room hotel isthe only one of its size proposed near the convention center.

The Starwood team has been struggling to come up with financingfor the hotel. The company nearly gave up on the project about sixmonths ago but was given two extensions to arrange financing.Hoping to make the deal more appealing to investors, financialconcessions have also been made by both sides--with theMassachusetts Convention Center Authority agreeing to reduce theannual rent and the Starwood team agreeing to accept a smallerdevelopment fee. The last piece of that puzzle is the request theteam made to the city for tax abatement under Section 121A of statelaw. Starwood has made it clear that it believes that that iscrucial to the success of the deal but it is unclear whether thecity will agree to it. The issue was further complicated when citytreasurer Edward Collins, who is handling the project for the city,suffered a stroke this past Tuesday night.

"Starwood believes the tax abatement triggers a green light forfinancing," Moscaritolo points out. "There is a causal relationshipbetween all these factors." The city was initially very resistantto provide the tax break but, says Moscaritolo, if everybody elsewas willing to make the deal go through by giving financialconcessions the city is going to look more favorably on theissue.