March 7, 2022

Another hotel is coming to the Sanford Sports Complex.

It’s a Comfort Inn & Suites being developed by Stan Westland and Eric Seljeskog.

The two also own the AmericInn in Sioux Falls at 3300 W. Russell St. and have been interested in the sports complex since they started looking at the market five years ago, Westland said.

“The timing was just right,” he said, adding their other property is “going very well. We get a lot of overflow from all the hotels.”

The four-story, 86-room Comfort Inn & Suites is “a nice family hotel with a lot of suites,” Westland said. “That area someday will be ready for a full-service (hotel), but especially with the advent of 18 new fields, sports teams don’t like to stay in full-service hotels. You want a place with a free hot breakfast in the morning.”

This Comfort Inn will include an enlarged indoor pool, hot tub, fitness center and a lounge that will serve beer, wine and pizza. There will be two fire pits outside and multiple meeting rooms in anticipation of team events or meals.

The hotel will be built near Blue Rock Bar & Grill and join the Fairfield Inn & Suites in providing a hotel option at the Sports Complex.

“It’s a home run location for them,” said Jim Dunham of Jim Dunham & Associates, who represented the Comfort Inn deal. “They’re ecstatic.”

The 18 new turf fields at the complex will be driving even more attendance at the Sanford Sports Complex once they begin play this summer.

“We anticipate we’ll have 1 million new participants in youth and adult sports programs, events and tournaments over the next five years,” said Steve Young, president of the Sports Complex. “We know most of these individuals and families desire to stay on-site, and we’re excited for an additional hotel at the Sports Complex campus.”

The area around the sports complex continues to evolve in use. The next few years are expected to bring construction of Sanford Health’s new virtual hospital and the applied research lab that will kick off Dakota State University’s planned cyber campus.

Hotel construction is expected to start in April and take about a year.