“Bedbug reports worry travelers, vex hoteliers” plus 1 more |
| Bedbug reports worry travelers, vex hoteliers Posted: 01 Jan 2011 11:24 PM PST New Mexico is catching up with the rest of the country when it comes to worries about bedbugs. But hotel managers say recent publicity may be making guests needlessly paranoid. New York City, San Francisco and Cincinnati, Ohio, have made headlines since at least 2006 for bedbug infestations. New Mexico's first major bedbug story didn't break until 2008, when three Santa Fe police officers complained about being bitten while staying at the Days Inn in Farmington. So far this year, outbreaks of bedbugs have been reported at hotels, motels and campgrounds in Albuquerque, Clovis, Gallup, Las Cruces, Roswell, Taos, Truth or Consequences and Santa Fe. The Bedbug Registry — a website that provides anonymous reports of bedbugs in various accommodations — was started by computer programmer Maciej Ceglowski in 2006 after what he calls "a traumatic experience in a San Francisco hotel." The website includes tips on how to find, identify and eradicate the pests. The Bedbug Registry's most recent posting naming a Santa Fe motel concerned the Thunderbird Inn, 1821 Cerrillos Road, on Sept. 18. "Girlfriend & I checked in on Saturday afternoon and she started itching as soon as we arrived," said the anonymous complainant. "Thinking it was cheap soap we brushed it off until the following morning when we both had bites. We physically picked these critters off the bedspread. We were both bitten multiple times and she actually broke out in hives. We reported this to owner of motel who concurred that he had recently had our room fumigated for bugs!!!" Ray Bhakda, general manager of the Thunderbird Inn, where rooms start at $30 a night, said this week he had not even heard of the complaint. "No, we never had a problem of this kind," he said. "Nobody complained over here." Two other Santa Fe area accommodations that were the subject of postings this year — the Lodge at Santa Fe and "Kabin #2" at KOA Kampground — previously told The New Mexican they had taken care of the problems. A Lodge employee expressed surprise this week that the complaint remained on the website and suggested it might have come from another hotel or someone else wanting to disparage the Lodge. Among the Taos hotels making The Bedbug Registry this year was the "luxury eco-friendly" El Monte Sagrado Resort, where rooms start at $229 a night. "Bed bugs emerged from the headboard both nights," wrote an anonymous tipster on June 17 about a visit nine days earlier. "Initially unsure at first of what they were, we killed them. However, in the night we were awoken by the sensation of bugs crawling on us. Additionally, there were welts on my husband's body from the bites. Management denied there were bed bugs and did not address the problem." An employee of El Monte Sagrado who recalled handling the complaint but did not want to be identified said no bedbugs were found. "Some people are just paranoid about (bedbugs) or they may be just ill-informed," he said. "Other times, they may be trying to get something out of us because we usually compensate them for their trouble, but in no case have we had any confirmed report. We will send documentation (that a room was treated for bedbugs, but that none were found) to that Bedbug Registry, but they don't ever report that or remove us from their list." Art Bouffard, executive director of the Santa Fe Lodgers Association and president of the New Mexico Lodgers Association, said that so far, no bedbug infestations have been confirmed at any Santa Fe hotel or motel. "We've had one or two reports in Santa Fe from people who thought there were bedbugs and immediately they were moved to different rooms," he said. "Pest control was brought in and it was found in both incidents that they were not bedbugs. There were flying insects that had got in the bed and the person got squeamish and ran down and said that they had bedbugs." Bouffard's assertion drew snickers from Larry Plecha, an entomologist with Biotec Consulting working with New Mexico hotels to eradicate pests. He declined to identify any of the hotels. "There's hardly a lodging establishment that hasn't been affected by it," he said. "I would have to say that some pest control is going in at least one hotel room every single day in New Mexico. ... "We're getting hit pretty hard right now. The good news is that at least the hotel people here in New Mexico are trying to be proactive and we're getting a lot of cooperation." Plecha said bedbug infestations have nothing to do with general cleanliness. Plecha said when he first began to look into bedbug infestations 10 years ago in San Francisco, the hardest-hit hotels were those catering to tourists from Germany and France, including "one of the most famous hotels in America." The widespread use of DDT virtually wiped out bedbugs in the U.S. in the years following World War II. But after the pesticide was banned in 1972, the pests began to show up again in places frequented by international travelers — estimated to be more than 10 percent of New Mexico's tourists. "I call tell you why in three words: soft-sided luggage," said Plecha who uses a set of old-style, hard-sided luggage for his own travels. "Bedbugs will gain a purchase on our soft-sided luggage, and we, as guests of hotels and being on airplanes, will transport them around the country. ... To put it in plainer English, they grab on much easier." Not even Santa Fe's oldest hotel, La Fonda, is exempt from bedbug complaints. General Manager John Rickey said when some guests recently complained about bedbugs, they were transferred to another room so EcoLab Inc. could inspect for the pests. Even though the exterminators found nothing, Rickey said, he told them to go ahead and begin the expensive eradication procedures. "I just can't have the reputation," he said. "There's such a negative connotation about it." Contact Tom Sharpe at 986-3080 or tsharpe@sfnewmexican.com. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
| Hotel stays not to be a problem Posted: 01 Jan 2011 03:25 PM PST By Levin. T. Black/Williston Herald Thousands of fans are expected to descend upon Williston for the Babe Ruth League World Series in 2013. With lodging already an issue in town concerns were raised as to how there would be room for all the fans. The oil boom created a housing problem. With no where else to go, many of the oil workers have piled into the hotels creating a shortage of rooms for any visitor in town. Amy Krueger, executive director for Williston Convention and Visitor's Bureau, said she is not worried about finding rooms for everyone. "We will work with the hotels very closely," she said. "We are currently at 699 rooms [in town]. We will be close to one thousand rooms in 2013 ... we should have no problem with that at all." Two hotels are currently being built. They are HomStay Suites and Micro Motel. Tournament director, Larry Grondahl, said they expect at least two more hotels to be built by 2013 but isn't allowed to say who just yet. Williston is only required to supply lodging for the coaches, Babe Ruth representatives and the umpires. However, tournament chairman, Larry Grondahl, said they are making preparations for the fans as well. He said they will monitor the housing situation in Williston and are optimistic things will have improved drastically by the time they must make a decision. "This boom hitting us so fast and so furious that our housing is just trying to get caught up," he said. "I think that will probably happen between now and then. If it doesn't we will just have to get together with the hotels and block rooms out." Grondahl explained that if the hotels in town still have low vacancies when the tournament is a year away the tournament committee will negotiate with the hotels to get large amounts of rooms blocked off for the time the World Series will be going on. Those rooms will then be made available for fans traveling to Williston for the tournament. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
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