Jun. 21--STEVENSON, Wash.--It's clear why Dolce is part of the Skamania Lodge name. 

Some loyal local customers blanched last year when Dolce International, a Montvale, N.J., company, bought the lodge and attached its name to the property. 

Now, a just-completed $15 million expansion is probably quelling some of those ill feelings, in part because the new space may end up creating 60 jobs at the 300-employee Skamania County hotel and conference facility. 

With unemployment at 10.6 percent among Skamania County's 9,900 residents, the area could use an expansion from its largest private employer. 

And anyone who sees the new conference space will notice Dolce's attention to the corporate market. 

The 10-year-old Dolce Skamania Lodge, about 50 miles east of Vancouver near Stevenson, opened its new guest rooms last week and officially unveiled the entire expansion Thursday. 

The lodge is part of Dolce International's ownership and/or operation of 10 U.S. hotel properties, another in Canada and five in Europe. The privately held company reports it generated about $200 million in revenue in 2001 and describes itself as a global conference center business. 

Along with its hotels, Dolce runs training centers in Fort Worth, Texas, for American Airlines and two IBM New York properties. 

The Stevenson hotel is the company's first West Coast location, giving it a true coast-to-coast identity. 

Dolce purchased the Stevenson facility and surround property from Lend Lease Real Estate Investments of Chicago in February 2001, after managing it for four years. Dolce promptly attached its name to the marquis and announced the expansion. 

The facility already had a ballroom with capacity for 500 people at a banquet, larger than any similar space in Clark County. Now, there are 16 smaller rooms dedicated specifically to smaller meetings as well. 

The construction added 10,000 square feet of new meeting room space, bringing the total to 22,000 square feet and taking maximum conference attendance capacity from 984 people to 1,659. 

Fifty-nine more guest rooms were also added to bring the total to 254. 

Andy Dolce, the company's chief executive officer, said the expansion will make the lodge a bigger player in attracting corporate conference business from throughout the West. 

Ken Daugherty, the hotel's general manager, said big Portland-area companies such as Nike, Intel and Adidas use the facility for conferences and retreats, flying in employees from other locations to meet with local workers. 

But, he said, adding the Dolce name and upgrading the site will likely generate traffic from companies already used to meeting in Dolce facilities in other locations. 

Daugherty said the new conference space at Skamania takes advantage of the setting without overwhelming conference attendees with scenery. "Most of the rooms have a view but they're not distracting," he said. 

The new conference rooms are wired to facilitate high-tech presentations. Tables and chairs are corporate boardroom-style pieces designed for comfort in all-day meetings. 

The lowest price for a conference room is $400 per day, which does not include lodging or food. A $259-per-day-per-person package includes lodging, provides bottled water and small snacks inside the meetings rooms, three meals over the course of the day and an ongoing snack buffet outside the room. 

"Companies are spending good money to come out and get something accomplished," Daugherty said. 

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(c) 2002, The Columbian, Vancouver, Wash. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News. IBM, NKE, INTC, ADDDY,