The Fayetteville City Council held a work session on Monday, May 4, 2026, starting at 3:00 PM, with a recess for public forum and announcements, then reconvened. The council discussed 11 agenda items, including the 910 Future Fest, downtown updates, economic development program modernization, water/sewer assistance, transit amenities, and policy revisions. Several items received consensus direction, and two council member requests were advanced for budget discussion.
And welcome to the May Fourth work session. We will call this meeting to order, and the invocation will be provided by Council Member Ferguson. Let us all stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. Um, I may need your indulgence as well as I gathered up some of them to come back to you later after I've had a moment to confer with the city attorney. But probably most pressing for me at the moment is that um we receive word that uh the historic preservation fund grant for college heights and Seabrook Hills community architectural archaeological survey um is um they need authorization and support from the city for sixteen thousand dollars of grant match. Chris, where are you at? Um did I get that right? If you could come up briefly and talk about that. If you could come up briefly and talk about that, what I'm gonna be asking uh Mayor Pro Jam and looking to the city attorney since she and I have not had a chance to talk about this, is that if council can give me the nod that this is something that you generally support, I will put it on for your consent agenda for next week for you to approve, or um if the city attorney feels that for the sixteen thousand dollars and the authorization, we need to ask you to um add an item to the agenda to take action on it. Um my preference would be if we were able through consent to get your acknowledgement to do it, that we will put it on as a retroactive item for your meeting on is it Monday, June? Yes, sir, Monday. So, Chris, could you describe briefly what the item is? All right, there we go. Uh yes, sir, thank you. Uh uh for a little bit of time at the beginning of the meeting here. So um we received uh uh pretty pretty late last week that uh deadline for a certified local government grant from the state historic preservation office um was available. Um the city has recently uh applied for two of these grants. Um they were both for Broadell and um off of Merkison Road. Uh the first grant that we did performed in archaeological um and architectural and historic survey of the neighborhood in partnership with Fayetteville State University and the State Historic Preservation Office and the community to really compile a lot of information to tell a story about that neighborhood, folks who live there, um, and uh the growth of that area. The second grant we got was to hire a professional firm that would write the nomination to put that area into the National Register of Historic Places. That grant is still ongoing. We're right at the tail end of that process for that one. Um so every year these funds become available through the state, and we're eligible because we're a certified local government to apply for those funds. And so the request is to uh authorize approval for the college heights and seabrook hills areas, which are uh single family areas very very close aligned to the Broadale area. Um the grant is a total the project is a total of about 40,000 dollars, give or take a few. Um if it's 40,000, the grant will cover 24, and the city would need to cover the remaining 16. Um I don't currently have a funding source for this, so we would need to source it out of the general fund um at that time, but our grant policies and procedures and stuff require that council authorize staff to apply for it. Well, first let me go to councilmember here. Councilmember Hare, are you on? Yes, sir, I am. Can you give us some insight? Weren't you fighting for one of the neighborhoods to be uh designated historic? I don't know which one that we're referring to, but was college heights or seaborks either. Yes, they're they're both uh basically the same. They are both right there. Uh I think uh and and first uh just let me say thank you. I was I'm glad to be back with you all this, if no other way, but just on teams right now. Um I think our director just stated uh the the two different, but both basically the same. The Broadale Seabrook uh community and of course the College Heights community are somewhat within uh unison of each other. So I will be supporting uh for us to continue to move forward with this historical registry. What I would like to also ask uh, so I will move in to get a consensus vote for that, but also to have Mr. Collie to explain uh for the audience and and also to our members just what this registry means, and that this registry does not put any type of um uh full or bone restrictions on the neighborhood, meaning like they don't have to replace windows or different types of material structure as falls up under some of the uh the historical registries like we're speaking about sometimes for the downtown district. Thank you, sir. Did you want to address that, Mr. Collin? I think help some too, um Dr. Here and others. Um we um will definitely my recommendation in consultation with the city attorney as well is is that with the upward nod of council, just to say you're supportive of this, that we will give the nod um and will apply uh to uh the request came to us either on Thursday or Friday of last week. Um and um we would uh have all of those details and more in your agenda packet for next week, but we just wanted to give the nod, understanding how important this was to the council, the choice neighborhoods and the doctor here and others. If there's an effort or an interest to just kind of give us the nod or um to you, Dr.