Football star proposes Harlem hotel

Football star Emmitt Smith, the Hall of Famer best known for playing with the Dallas Cowboys and winning the television competition Dancing with the Stars, has announced plans to build a new, 200-room hotel in Harlem on the corner of 125th Street and Lenox Avenue, which is currently an empty lot, according to the Wall Street Journal. The $80 million project will include a Whole Foods on the ground floor, according to current plans, while a YMCA and an unnamed cultural center will occupy the third and fourth floors. But while Smith, who has asked the city for $19.8 million in tax-exempt financing to help spur the project along, is optimistic, Representative Charles Rangel isn’t quite ready to jump on the bandwagon. “I’ve been brokenhearted more than these things have come to reality,” Rangel said. “Bottom line, if it creates jobs, they will have my full attention.” [WSJ]