RIVER VALLEY and OZARK AREA — Cleburne County believes in recycling. In fact, the county Quorum Court recently recycled an old hospital building into a new office complex for city, county and state offices. The new Judge Claude Dill Office Complex opened its doors to new occupants in July.
The 34,000-square-foot building, at 2319 Highway 110 W. in Heber Springs, was built in 1969 and used as a county hospital until Baptist Health moved in about nine years ago. After Baptist Health built a new facility, the Cleburne County Quorum Court decided to sell the old building, despite County Judge Claude Dill’s suggestion to refurbish the structure.
“We had a bid for $1.1 million from another health facility,” Dill said. “It was under contract for 10 months, and they had to back out because they couldn’t get the funding.”
Dill said he went back to the Quorum Court and told the members that the building had been sitting vacant for more than two years, and it had started to deteriorate and had fallen victim to vandals.
“I got a committee together,and they looked at it and agreed we needed to do something,” Dill said. “I hired one person and used jail labor and community-service workers. We renovated the entire building. We spent $250,000, and we’ve got a great facility.”
The re-purposed hospital building now houses the Office of Emergency Management, 911, the Cleburne County Health Department and the Master Gardeners. There is another 12,000 square feet that Dill said will be occupied later.
“I could not have done anything without that man rightthere,” Greg Hutto, the man Dill hired to renovate the building, said as he pointed to Dill. “He coached me like a Little League coach.”
Dill, who said it took a lot of elbow grease, hot water and time to get the building suitable for occupancy, hired Hutto to supervise the maintenance and renovation of the building.
Jim Jackson, director of the Cleburne County Economic Development Council, said recycling the building and consolidating county offices have saved the county money. The countyis also collecting rent on other buildings that have become vacant since the move into the new facility.
“Updating the heating and air units to more efficient ones and consolidating all these groups saves money on utilities,” Jackson said.
Jackson also said there is still room for expansion.
“Reincarnation is an amazing thing, and that’s what [Dill] has done. He’s brought it back from the dead,” Hutto said. “He knows every bolt that has been turned in this building.”
As the renovation was completed, Dill said, he went back to the Quorum Court and suggested that the complex have a name.
“Wetzel Stark suggested it be the Judge Claude Dill Complex,” Dill said, then chuckled. “It feels weird. It wasn’t until about two weeks ago that I could say, ‘The Dill Complex.’”
Dill is in his 18th year as county judge, and before that he served on the Wilburn School Board and as a volunteer firefighter with the Wilburn Fire Department.
- jbrosius@ arkansasonline.com
River Valley Ozark, Pages 60 on 07/29/2010