‘Old City Hall can be restored’

Yes, Rockdale’s 123-year-old former City Hall can be restored to its Victorian Era glory.

Now it’s up to the city, and volunteers, to come up with the funding to make that proposed project a reality.

Architect, and Rockdale High School graduate Stan Graves, and the Architexas firm recently completed a survey of the building and will appear before the city council on June 11 to make a formal report.

“It’s structurally sound,” Graves told The Reporter. It can handle the renovation, and restoration, that has been proposed.

RESTORATION—

Graves and City Manager Chris Whittaker recently met with community leaders and other interested persons to review possible options for the building, which will continue to serve as the city’s police station until the new police station on the eastern end of downtown is completed.

Whittaker said the option which appeared to have the most consensus was for a restaurant downstairs and as-yet unspecified occupants—perhaps offices and entity headquarters—upstairs.

Graves said other options to be presented will include a “barebones” approach and a possible visitor center-museum on the first floor.

“But all of them would include restoration of the building to the way it looked in the 19th Century, up until the major renovations in the 1930s,” he said.

And that includes restoration of the full length of the second story, which once housed a basketball court and an auditorium which was early Rockdale’s large gathering place for graduations, political meetings and more.

“It was built sort of as an opera house,” Graves said. “We don’t really know how it looked inside up there and we don’t plan to make it an auditorium again, but that space which was lost can be put back.”

$1-MILLION—That, of course, costs money. An “extremely preliminary” cost estimate ranges between $2.1 and $3.5 million, depending on which restoration option is chosen.

That’s not quite as daunting as it may appear. Last August an anonymous donor pledged to match up to $1-million in funds raised toward the project.

“That means we’ve got to get to work and pursue grants, fund-raising and revenue sources once the council decides how it wants us to proceed,” Whittaker said.

“Revenue source” is a term that comes up, again, when the building’s ultimate use is discussed.

“This big advantage of having a restaurant in the building is that it will provide a revenue stream,” Whittaker said. “It would be leased, of course.”

SHOWPIECE—Graves noted the original City Hall bell still exists—it’s on display outside the building—and it should play a part in the restoration.

“The bell could go back up in the central tower,” he said. “Then it could be programmed to sound at certain times, whatever is decided by the city.”

The bell was once used to summon the Volunteer Fire Department. Until the 1970s, Old City Hall was the home of the RVFD.

“The back area on the first floor was actually built to accommodate horse-drawn fire apparatus,” Graves said.

“This (restoration) would be something Rockdale will point to with a great deal of pride,” he said. “It’s going to attract more people. You’re going to see people who want to come to Rockdale to see it.”