Rick and Gail Holmes: Googling the new Gateway owners

Publicity hounds they're not.

Rick and Gail Holmes waved away a request for a television interview last night, and became visibly tense as SooToday trained its lens on them as they were introduced as the prospective new owners of the Gateway Project.

Here, compiled from the material presented to City Council last night, and by running the Holmes through Google (SooToday's favourite search engine), is what we know about the newest additions to our business community.

No relation to MagiCorp's Chris Holmes

First, you need to know that Rick Holmes is no relation to Chris Holmes of MagiCorp Entertainment Inc.

MagiCorp, we learned last night, is still involved in facilitating the Gateway Project (it's been re-named Legacy Quest), but will not be the owner or operator.

Holmes has announced that he intends to buy the property adjacent to the Casino, and has $43 million in private sector financing, in addition to $15 million expected from the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund.

He intends to build a 50,000-square-foot arts, culture, heritage and entertainment attraction that will complement Science North, but will not compete with the Sudbury institution.

Operates beneath the radar

Like many successful developers of SooToday's acquaintance, Holmes appears to operate largely outside the radar of the popular media.

Running him through Google produces only a handful of relevant hits.

We can tell you that Holmes is president and chief executive officer of Kittling Ridge Winery Inn and Suites, located in Grimsby in the heart of Ontario's Niagara wine country.

Built three years ago adjacent to Ontario's first combination winery/distillery, the three-diamond facility offers 79 deluxe rooms, conference and banquet facilities for up to 350, a full fitness center with indoor pool and whirlpool, as well as a rooftop lounge overlooking Lake Ontario.

Photos of the Kittling Ridge Winery Inn

The following photographs are published on SooToday.com by special permission of Rick Holmes of Kittling Ridge Winery Inn and Suites:

Lobby and grand staircase Dining room Lobby and gift boutique Chardonnay Suite Swimming pool Building exterior If you love the place, click here Keeping out of the papers

As far as our Google search is concerned, it reveals that aside from a few unfortunate appearances in the Hamilton Spectator, Holmes has done an admirable job of keeping his face and name out of the papers.

In March of this year, the Spectator's social columnist described a Kittling Ridge fundraiser for the Hamilton Philharmonic at which Holmes participated in a Horatio Hornblower-like scene, risking his neck with his staff to wrestle down a large tent that was being blown away by what the newspaper described as "hurricane-like winds."

Lister Block

A handful of other articles describe a troubled effort by Holmes to redevelop the Lister Block, a crumbling structure in downtown Hamilton that hasn't had a tenant since 1995. To see that building and read about its history, please click here.

The Lister Block is owned by the Labourers International Union of North America.

The Kittling Ridge group was a partner with the Labourers in the Lister project. With a commitment from the City of Hamilton for $7 million in rent, the partners were proposing a hotel, condominium and commercial complex.

However, the owner of a building that currently houses the Hamilton Farmers' Market brought a $260 million lawsuit against the City over its plan to move the market to the Lister development.

That cast a heavy cloud over the project, prompting Spectator columnist Jack MacDonald to pronounce the deal dead in late February.

Sault Ste. Marie

Here in the Sault, Holmes intends to build a 50,000-square-foot tourist attraction including a 500-seat performing arts facility, a 150-room four-star hotel with an overhead walkway to the casino, a 10,000-square-foot-or-greater Italian-themed restaurant and food market, parking for 400 vehicles and a 5,000-square-foot heritage railway museum that will incorporate the Agawa Canyon tour train station.

To read more about the new Gateway proposal, please click here.