CONWAY -- The City Council voted Tuesday night to enter into a purchase-and-sale agreement for a 22-acre site that Mayor Tab Townsell has proposed turning into a community center.
The agreement with Cavalier Home Builders LLC sets the purchase price at $3.5 million.
The site, which lies along Dave Ward Drive and across the highway from a Wal-Mart Supercenter on Conway's west side, includes a vacant, 5-acre building formerly used to manufacture mobile homes.
Aldermen also agreed to put down $100,000 in earnest money that Townsell said would be refundable even if the city decides, after a 45-day feasibility study, not to proceed with the purchase. If the city does nothing after that 45-day period, the sale would proceed, he told the aldermen.
The City Council also voted to hire Nabholz Construction Services to conduct the environmental and structural study of the proposed site. Mayoral aide Jack Bell said the study would cost $4,000.
Townsell said Nabholz also would address the question of whether the building is suitable for conversion into a community center.
There has been no decision on what recreational facilities a center would include, but an indoor swimming pool and indoor tennis courts have been among the discussed possibilities.
Alderman David Grimes said aldermen should start deciding what facilities to include because that information is important to determine construction and operational costs. He said he also would like to see a list of things awaiting completion at the city's parks.
The votes on all of the measures related to the community-center proposal were unanimous. Aldermen Theodore Jones Jr. and Wesley Pruitt were absent.
State Desk on 05/13/2015