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Six of the seven men who spoke during
Tuesday night’s public hearing about a
site for Wake Forest’s new town hall
urged the commissioners to choose the
site on Elm Avenue between South White
and Brooks now occupied by DAB.
The only dissenting voice
was that of Jerry Doliner, whose firm,
The Cleaners, owns the laundromat on
Brooks near the second site under
consideration. Doliner said he had not
been approached about relocating or
selling. “I’d be willing to sell my
property at the fair market value – or
better.”
Tom Iversen, chairman of the
Downtown Revitalization Corporation, led
off by citing all the ways the new
building will or could influence the
downtown area. “You have an opportunity
to create a building with style and
substance that reflects the heritage of
the town and makes a tangible statement
about the vision of the town.”
Craig Briner’s company, East
Elm Partners, owns Wake Forest Plaza
across Brooks Street from the DAB site.
He has offered to build Brooks Street
through to Holding Avenue, refurbish the
plaza buildings, build a three-story
retail office building at Brooks and Elm
and bring a site plan to the town this
summer for 120 upscale townhouses on the
12 acres he owns next to the plaza. He
was low-key Tuesday night, calling the
town hall “a pebble dropped in the pond
that could spur other public and private
investment around it.”
Former commissioner Rob
Bridges said both were good sites, but
“I do believe the better site would be
what is now the DAB site” because it
would be the heart of downtown as it
grows south and east.
Former mayor Dick Monteith,
a realtor who represents Briner, said
the DAB site is “a complete package with
all the land you need for expansion and
parking.” At the Brooks Street site,
Monteith said, the town could be buying
land incrementally – Green & Wooten
insurance, the American Legion building,
the laundromat – over the years at
increasing cost.
Both Jeff Adolphsen and
Matthew Hale worked on the Renaissance
Plan and encouraged the commissioners to
follow its comprehensive planning
approach.
The commissioners may
discuss the site at their work session
March 7, which begins at 5 p.m.
It will definitely be on the
March 21 regular meeting agenda, and
Town Manager Mark Williams said they
would need a closed session early in
that meeting to hear offers to sell the
needed land. |
