Sources: Disney Plans Oahu Resort

Disney Hotel Could Be Located Next To Ihilani

POSTED: 3:10 pm HST October 1, 2007
UPDATED: 8:26 pm HST October 1, 2007

HONOLULU -- The Walt Disney Co. could announce as soon as this week that it is looking to build a resort on Oahu, according to KITV sources.

Disney plans to build a hotel in Ko Olina.

Sources told KITV Disney is looking at undeveloped land on the Diamond Head side of the Ihilani Resort and Spa. That is where sources said Disney would build its own resort or condos with direct access to Lagoons one and two at Ko Olina.

"We've got nothing to announce today, and that the company is not confirming the speculation," Walt Disney Parks and Resorts spokeswoman Lisa Haines said.

Haines refused to go into further detail. However, she did elaborate on the company's business approach.

"We look at many geographies, and clearly Hawaii is an attractive market, but we look at many geographies as we think about ways to grow our business," Haines said.

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Disney's chief financial officer told an investor conference just a few weeks ago that Disney does not plan to build any more theme parks in the United States. He said the company is looking at other international locations for theme parks.

Disney owns numerous resorts at and near its Anaheim, Calif., and Orlando, Fla., theme parks. It also has a Disney Vacation Club, which operates time-share condos in Hilton Head, South Carolina and Vero Beach, Fla.

Ko Olina developer Jeff Stone did not return KITV's phone call for comment.

Earlier this year, Stone's company returned a $75 million state tax credit because it no longer planned a world-class aquarium there. Stone said the Ko Olina resort area was in the middle of $1 billion of development and he had not used the tax credit since it was granted in 2003.

KITV's sources cautioned that these types of deals are never sure things until construction begins.

The sources said that Stone has negotiated and been close to making deals with Mandarin resorts, the Trump organization, Four Seasons and the Ritz Carlton to develop properties at Ko Olina, but all those deals eventually fell through, some of them even after a letter of intent was signed.