City Council Discussion on Lindsay Street Water Tower Contract with Dr. Pepper/7Up – July 28, 2026
City Council Discussion on Lindsay Street Water Tower Contract with Dr. Pepper/7Up – July 28, 2026
The Norman City Council held a conference on Tuesday, July 28, 2026, at 5:30 PM to discuss a proposed 10-year contract with Dr. Pepper/7Up to paint and brand the historic Lindsay Street Water Tower as a tourism attraction. The meeting was led by the Mayor, with presentations from the Parks Director and legal staff.
Discussion Items
- Contract Overview: The Parks Director presented a 10-year, $500,000 contract ($50,000 per year plus a $25,000 upfront payment for painting and a final $25,000 payment). Dr. Pepper/7Up can extend the contract with 100 days' notice. If the agreement ends early, the company will pay up to $25,000 to paint over the logo. The tower is approximately 2,500 feet from the football stadium and will feature the Dr. Pepper logo on two sides. All work must be completed by October 15, 2026, with a kickoff event planned for October 17, 2026 (the first SEC game against Kentucky).
- City Responsibilities: The city must maintain the site (structural integrity, electrical, mowing, weed eating, lighting). Lighting is under bid and not required by the contract. The city will replace the existing barbed-wire fence. Any vandalism must be remedied within 15 days, subject to bid limits. The tower will be designated a special use park, allowing unique rules.
- Tourism and Marketing: The city and Dr. Pepper/7Up will partner to promote the tower through visitor guides and digital tourism. Dr. Pepper/7Up may install temporary attractions, sample products, and hold up to five special events per year. The tower will be referred to as the "Fansville Water Tower" during the marketing campaign, though Dr. Pepper controls branding.
- History and Context: Councilmember Steele noted that the tower, nearly 100 years old and unused for 15 years, had been discussed since a March 2024 council committee meeting regarding demolition or repainting. Previous attempts to partner with OU or local organizations did not gain traction. The idea for a Dr. Pepper partnership arose from Fansville commercials and connections made by Councilmember Dixon. The contract avoids the estimated $500,000 demolition cost and provides a tourism benefit.
- Questions and Clarifications: Councilmember Kirby asked about lighting requirements; staff confirmed the contract does not require lighting, and options could be scaled back. Councilmember Cansbury inquired about using the tower in city marketing; staff confirmed the city can use images in digital tourism. The painting bid is based on a two-coat system with a third coat for the logo, and Dr. Pepper will specify exact colors (e.g., a specific shade of red).
Key Outcomes
- No formal vote was taken during this discussion meeting; the council heard the presentation, asked questions, and expressed support. The meeting adjourned after the discussion. Staff will proceed with coordination and implementation pending final council approval at a future meeting. The next steps include painting the tower, landscaping, lighting installation, and planning the October kickoff event.
Meeting Transcript
Everybody's here, so I guess we can go ahead and get started. It is 5 30, so yeah, we'll go ahead and get started. Welcome to the city council conference for Tuesday, July 28th, 2026. We have one item on the agenda, and that is a discussion regarding the Lindsay Street Water Tower contract with Dr. Pepper slash seven up Inc. And uh Parks Director and legal staff are here to talk about that with us. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you to the council. Uh very excited to talk about this today. This has been something that's been in the works in the background for I would say about 90 days. We've been 90 to 120 days. We've been working uh with the representatives from Dr. Pepper to try to put the a good contract uh together to bring um to you. Uh like uh I was sitting here thinking about uh you have a great combination between me and Chris. Uh I was thinking um Talla Day Gonites, um one of us a shake, one of us spake. I'm not gonna tell you which one. Uh but we've been working together. He's been more working on the um construction side of trying to get the tower painted, and we've been uh me and Catherine have been working together trying to get the tourism contract together. So, first thing we want to uh throw out there is uh Lindsay Street uh water tower is really really close to the football stadium. Uh it does have some great angles um inside the stadium. Uh so it's very attractive for a organization or a business like um Dr. Pepper to uh want to put their their logo on there. We're about 25, a little bit over 2500 feet from Water Tower to Football Stadium. Uh and as you can see, we're right there on the corner of uh Lindsay and almost Class and Boulevard. Uh so if y'all uh looked at the contract tonight, you saw that this is the conceptual drawing or art that uh Dr. Pepper sent to us last week as we were uh finalizing our contract. Um so we are referring to this uh as Fansville Water Tower. Um when I'm saying we, that's city staff. Um uh when it actually gets put together with a marketing campaign and everything that goes along with Dr. Pepper. Uh just want to be very upfront there. They they control uh their brand. Uh they will be able to uh call it what they want, you know, something different. We might refer to it as Fansville, but we don't know how long that that marketing campaign will necessarily last. So uh it will be uh Dr. Pepper logo up there. It's uh 10 years about and it's 500,000. Uh the first payment you will see will be uh the 50,000 plus 25,000 for the painting of the logo. Uh they will pay $50,000 a year until the 10th year of the contract, and that final payment will be $25,000. We uh asked for more up front to help uh paint the the Dr. Pepper logo on there. Uh Dr. Pepper can extend the the contract with a hundred days notice. Uh if they choose to end the agreement, uh they will have to pay up to 120 or up to 25,000 to uh paint over the logo. Uh we don't necessarily know what that will look like. Uh our first thoughts would uh maybe we'll just go ahead and um paint it red to uh because it will be more than probably 25,000 to if we went back to a uh different color option of uh maybe painting it white or something like that. Uh uh Dr. Pepper 7 Up um will provide the final artwork, so this is not necessarily what will be painted on the tower, and they will pick the placement. We would imagine that would line up pretty um close in in angle towards the stadium, and and they also want a logo on the other side, so it'd be Dr. Pepper painted twice up there.
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