Black-owned Miami resort to open

A black-owned luxury resort in Miami Beach, Florida, opens for business next month, the product of a plan drafted by activists, city officials and lodging executives that ended a black tourist boycott.

The 422-room Royal Palm Crowne Plaza is made up of two Art Deco hotels, the old Royal Palm and the Shorecrest, and blends seamlessly with the beach’s other refurbished hotels.

It will open next month and has been booked to host the 2003 conference of the civil rights group National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People.

‘‘The opening of our hotel allows Miami-Dade to say to the African-American community, locally and nationally, that a promise was made and a promise is being kept,’’ said R Donahue Peebles, president of Peebles Atlantic Development Corporation and majority owner of the Royal Palm Crowne Plaza.