SANDER MEDNICK, ESQ., Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer
Mr. Mednick is an attorney who is licensed to practice law in the States of Florida and Maryland, and in the District of Columbia. He received degrees in business administration from The American University (B.S.B.A., 1970) and the University of Maryland (M.B.A., 1974); and in law from the University of Maryland (J.D., 1974), and Georgetown University (LL.M., Taxation, 1979). During the past twenty five years, Mr. Mednick has provided legal and business consultative services, with an emphasis on the hospitality industry and complex real estate transactions, to both private enterprise and governmental entities. He has also represented a host of financial institutions and merchant banks. For a period of three years, Mr. Mednick served as a consultant to the Federal Savings and Loan Corporation ("FSLIC") and the Resolution Trust Corporation ("RTC") with regard to complex real estate financing and loan "work-out" matters.
In 1987, Mr. Mednick assisted with the formation of Grand Heritage Hotels, Inc. ("Grand Heritage"), a hotel acquisition, management and operating company based in Annapolis, Maryland, and which was acquired by Patriot American Hospitality Inc. in 1997. During the period 1989 through 1996, Mr. Mednick served as Senior Vice President and General Counsel of that company. He helped oversee the development of Grand Heritage into a company which ultimately owned and operated and/or managed a portfolio of seventeen historic hotel properties located throughout the United States, and which served as the worldwide sales and marketing representative of nearly seventy historic hotel properties located throughout the United Kingdom, Spain, France, Ireland and Italy. In particular, during this period, Mr. Mednick interacted extensively with banks and institutional lenders, and their management and legal counsel throughout the United States and Europe.
In 1997, Mr. Mednick, along with Michael L. Wachtell, Esq., formed Milestone Hotel Partners, LLC ("MHP") and its management of operating affiliate, Milestone Hospitality International. MHP has acquired ownership the Hilton Hotel, Silver Spring, Maryland; Fort Lauderdale, Florida; the Days Inn (Busch Gardens Maingate), Tampa, Florida; the Days Inn, North Fort Myers, Florida; a consortium of four (4) Days Inns located throughout the Commonwealth of Kentucky, and which serve the principal cities of Louisville, Frankfort and Greater Cincinnati; the Microtel Inn and Suites, Sulphur, Louisiana; the Best Western Inn, Hershey, Pennsylvania; the Best Western Inn, Utica, New York; the Holiday Inn, New Hartford, New York; and the Holiday Inn (Harrisburg-Hershey), Grantville, Pennsylvania; and the Holiday Inn, Deland, Florida.
During his career and presently through MHP, Mr. Mednick has been involved with all aspects of financing, tax and transactional matters involving real estate with a value in excess of One Billion Dollars. He has served as the chief strategic planner and project coordinator for numerous commercial and residential real estate projects located throughout the United States. Mr. Mednick has lectured extensively in his areas of specialization to members of the legal community, and other professional and educational organizations.
MICHAEL L. WACHTELL, ESQ., Principal of MHP/General Counsel of MHI
Mr. Wachtell is a senior partner and member of the management committee of the Los Angeles, California, based law firm of Buchalter, Nemer, Fields and Younger. He specializes in commercial litigation and has an extensive background in real estate, banking, commercial and secured transactions, insurance, proprietary rights, patent and trademark law, domestic and international trade regulation matter, and debtor-creditor representation. Mr. Wachtell is a Los Angeles Superior Court "Approved and Appointed Receiver", "Referee", "Provisional Director", "Arbitrator and Settlement Officer", and serves in these capacities in connection with complex commercial matters. He also serves as an arbitrator for the American Arbitration Association and is a licensed real estate broker. He is a former Judge Pro Tem in the Beverly Hills and Los Angeles Municipal and Small Claims Courts and currently serves as the director of the California Receivers Forum.
Mr. Wachtell received his undergraduate education from the City College of New York, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Electrical Engineering degree in 1964. He earned his law degree (J.D., with honors) from the George Washington University School of Law in 1968. While at law school, Mr. Wachtell served as a member of the George Washington University Law Review, and was affiliated with the Delta Theta Phi, honor society.
Mr. Wachtell is admitted to practice before the bars of the States of California, Nevada, and Virginia, the District of Columbia, and the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Mr. Wachtell lectures extensively in his areas of specialization and has served on the faculty of the University of San Fernando Law School as an Associate Professor. He is a member of the Century City, Beverly Hills, Los Angeles County and American Bar Associations, the Los Angeles Business Trial Lawyers Association and the Los Angeles Patent Law Association.
LEA ANN KISH, Principal of MHP/Chief Operating Officer of MHI
Ms. Kish received a degree in Hotel, Restaurant, and Institutional Management from the Pennsylvania State University in 1987 and an M.B.A. from the New York University Stern School of Business in 2006. She began her hospitality career with the Potomac Hotel Group, Washington, D.C. on whose behalf she managed a number of three and four star, independent upscale hotels as well as full service brand hotels in the Washington, D.C., Maryland, and Virginia region.
In 1992, Ms. Kish joined Grand Heritage Hotels International, an owner and operator of four and five "star" historic hotel properties located throughout the United States, and was appointed General Manager of the "Four Star", "Four Diamond" Peabody Court Hotel in Baltimore, Maryland. In 1993 she was promoted to the position of Director of Transitions for the company, and during the period 1993 though 1997, oversaw all aspects of the integration of more than twenty newly acquired and/or contract managed properties into the Grand Heritage operating infrastructure. During this period she also served as the interim general manager for such prestigious full service, four and five star properties as the Clift Hotel, San Francisco, California; the Knickerbocker Hotel, Chicago, Illinois; the Ambassador West Hotel, Chicago, Illinois; the Tutwiler Hotel, Birmingham, Alabama; the Great Southern Hotel, Columbus, Ohio; the Stanley, Estes Park, Colorado; and the U.S. Grant Hotel, San Diego, California. She was responsible for the design and implementation of numerous capital and restoration projects to the Grand Heritage portfolio of properties, development of standardized operating procedures, establishment of brand loyalty and amenity programs, and human resource initiatives including management recruitment, career development, and training programs. She was also involved with organized labor negotiations in key markets such as San Francisco and Chicago.
Ms. Kish, as part of senior management assisted with the development of a strategic plan for the distribution of the Grand Heritage "brand" in the United States and in western Europe through the company's sales and marketing representation association with more than seventy historic hotel properties principally located in the United Kingdom, Spain, France, Ireland and Italy.
In 1995 Ms. Kish, in addition to her other duties and responsibilities, was promoted to the position of Regional Director of Operations with direct oversight of eight of the company's key owned and operated properties. Shortly thereafter, in 1997, she was appointed Vice President of Operations with responsibility for the direction of the entire Grand Heritage portfolio of properties in the United States. Her responsibilities and authority were further expanded in 1997 after the sale of the company to Patriot American Hospitality Inc. where as V.P. of Operations oversaw the "Wyndham-Grand Heritage" division.
In 1998 Ms. Kish became a principal and the Chief Operating Officer of Milestone Hospitality International and now oversees the operations of a portfolio of fourteen full and limited service hotels comprising 2,367 rooms with annual revenues of $76,000,000. Ms. Kish is a lifetime member of the Pennsylvania State Hotel and Restaurant Society and is an active member of the IAHI, the ownership association for Intercontinental Hotels. She also serves as the principal contact to the Hilton, Holiday Inn, Best Western, Days Inn and Microtel brands with which the company has affiliations.