Historic Webber Building Pending Sale, City Council Debates Other Topics
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Montgomery City Councilmen have agreed to sell the historic Webber building, which collapsed last year.
And several other hot topics were also debated at tonight’s city council meeting.
Last summer city officials were renovating the Webber building, now they’re selling it for one dollar.
It’s now a safety issue and officials say it’s not in the city’s best interest to hold onto it.
After months of uncertainty, the fate of the historic Webber building in downtown Montgomery has been decided. A private developer has agreed to buy the former Montgomery Theater.
“They’ve agreed to take the building,” says Mac McLeod, Director of Commercial Development. “They’ll take down the building, salvage all of the materials and then take the materials and reuse them in buildings on Dexter Avenue.”
McLeod says the city couldn’t afford to do anything with what’s left of the building. The private developer, who also bought the old Crest building, will have 15 days to decide whether to move forward with the project.
“This is not a demolition,” McLeod explains. “It is a deconstruction project. It’ll take three months to take it down. It’ll have to be taken down in pieces because of the size of the roof, weight of the roof there, so they’ll have a 15 day period to look at it and then they can close seven days after that.”
The council also tabled indefinitely a proposed ordinance to ban package stores in the city. Council member David Burkette was pushing for the ban but says now he wants to take time to clarify what it would do.
“I just felt that it wasn’t the right time to bring that up for a vote,” he says. “Not saying that it would have passed, not saying that it would have failed. But the whole situation is to get a bit more clarity.”
Downtown development continues. Two items on the agenda were approved that would allow developers to construct canopy/balcony structures over sidewalks on both Dexter Avenue and Commerce Street.
And finally, the council voted to table an ordinance that would rename Holcombe Street in Montgomery to Whitehurst Street, after Bernard Whitehurst, who was killed by Montgomery police in the 1970s. Police shot him after they wrongly believed he was involved in a robbery. Whitehurt’s son Stacy says he’ll continue to push for the name change.
“It was kind of a little frustrating to me and my brother. We’re still going to fight hard to try to get that accomplished.”
There was some opposition to renaming the street. Several residents came to council in protest. Those who support the name change will meet with those who don’t and with Councilman Arch Lee next week.
