Morro Bay City Council members unanimously approved TCL Family Enterprise's concept plan for a two-story mixed-use commercial project on the Embarcadero, which includes demolishing the Off the Hook building.

The company's proposal—a 25-foot building called Harborwalk Plaza—came before City Council on Oct. 9.

• Photo Courtesy Of The City Of Morro Bay
• RENOVATING THE SITES Though it's still in the concept design phase, the Harborwalk Plaza project will bring in a hotel, retail, and a restaurant to the Morro Bay Embarcadero.

"I'm really very excited about it, and I'm fully supportive of moving forward and approving it tonight," Councilmember Marlys McPherson said at the meeting.

The project is slated to have restaurant space, a yogurt shop, and retail on the first floor with an eight-room hotel on the second. Public amenities would include three public bathrooms, outdoor seating, a remodeled courtyard with an expanded children's play area, educational and ecological exhibits, and a viewfinder/telescope. The hotel is conditioned to provide 25 percent of its units at a rate equal to the city's low-cost overnight accommodations threshold.

Harborwalk would replace an existing ground-floor restaurant, retail space, and second floor office.

This isn't the first project proposal for the site. In 2000, the city issued a conditional-use permit for a project known as Smuggler's Inn, but the permit expired. In 2004, similar permits were granted to convert the existing upstairs office space into a three-unit bed and breakfast project, but it didn't move forward. In 2007, a similar mixed-use project known as the Outrigger was proposed, but it didn't go forward either.

The Harborwalk Plaza is one of two boutique hotel projects proposed for the Embarcadero. The other is a 10-room hotel on the second floor of Rose's Landing that the Morro Bay Planning Commission cleared to apply for building permits on Aug. 17.