Revere hotel says Boston owes it $654,000 for holding rooms for Mass and Cass homeless who never came

The owner of a Quality Inn on the Revere/Saugus line is suing the Boston Public Health Commission for the money it says it's owed for holding all of its rooms for three months in 2021 for Mass and Cass denizens who Boston never actually sent there once Revere and Saugus officials erupted in anger on learning of the plan.

In a lawsuit filed in Suffolk Superior Court on Friday, Sudguru Hotel of Brockton says its contract with the commission required the commission to pay for the rooms even if it never actually used them, and that because of the deal, the hotel didn't rent the rooms to anybody else.

The hotel, like many others, had closed at the start of the pandemic in the spring of 2020 - and it remained shut until earlier this year.

The Janey administration wanted to use the hotel as transitional housing for the people it was trying to move out of Mass and Cass.

Sudguru says it held all its rooms for commission use from Sept. 24, 2021 through Dec. 31, 2021. In the suit, Sudguru says that while its contract let the commission terminate the deal early, the commission never notified tbe company that it wanted to do so.

The company says it sent its first bill in October, 2021, followed up with two more invoices and then a notice of default ,and has yet to receive any payments.

BPHC did not contest or question the invoices during the months that Sudguru held the rooms for BPHC. ... BPHC has not paid anything nor has it explained any basis for its failure to either terminate the Agreement or make payment.

In addition to the invoice amounts, Sudguru is also asking for damages, including for the "difficulties in its relationship" with non-Boston government bodies once news of the deal got out.