When the Wake Forest Town Board meets for its regular work session Tuesday, March 7, the only item aside from the monthly financial report and a look at the March 21 business meeting is its first look at the Capital Improvements Plan for 2017-2022.
Some of the more interesting items are in the general government wish list which is headed by the rehabilitation of the Ailey Young House on North White Street. The town has spent or is spending $35,000 in fiscal 2016-2017 and could spend $69,500 in the next four years. The $35,000 included $17,034 from the Wake Forest Historic Preservation Commission (money largely from the biennial Historic Christmas Tour), $10,000 from a grant, $7,415 from in-kind donations, and $551 from the town’s general fund. The house has been stabilized but needs a roof to prevent future deterioration.
Other items in that wish list $5 million in future years for an east-side fire station and $25 million spread over four years for economic development, hopefully an industrial site.
Under public facilities readers will find a new police station with funding out in future years, but the expansion or relocation of the public works center is immediate. The town has already spent $200,000 on planning and engineering and expects it will take more than $27 million in all for the center.
Copies of the plan are available at town hall. It is interesting reading.
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The Trentini Foundation wants to hear from former board members, members of the Wake Forest High football team who played under Coach Tony Trentini and foundation supporters. It is an effort to re-establish the foundation’s past. If you would like to share your current contact information with the board, please contact Heather Holding at heatherjlh@gmail.com by March 17.
If you do that, you can be part of a new Trentini Foundation reunion which will take place on Saturday, March 25, after the Wake Forest High School Cougar Walk of Champions. The reunion will be held at the Stephenson Campus of Wake Forest Baptist Church on Wake Union Church Road. It will be a time to reconnect with friends and gather historical information.
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There are now some pretty firm dates for the expansion of the Wake Forest Library on East Holding Avenue, according to Terri M. Luke, the senior manager for facilities and security at Wake County Public Libraries.
The email from Luke this week said, “We are currently working on the design phase of the Wake Forest Library. We are scheduled to close the library in August 2017. The construction phase of the project is scheduled to take one year and the library needs one month to move in. If there are no delays in the construction schedule, we would open in September of 2018.”
The building will be expanded from 5,000 to 8,000 square feet, Wake County Library System Director Michael Wasilik said in 2015. It has always been too small since it opened in 1996. These days it either leads or is a close runner-up for number of books circulated.
The expanded library, Wasilik said, will be open four more hours than it is now and will have eight full-time employees, two of them children’s librarians. There will be more books and more programs but not any additional adult programs which are planned for regional libraries like the Northeast Regional Library in Wakefield where there is more space and chairs.
The Gazette will have further updates.
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At least one Gazette reader has noticed some different-appearing poles. They are light gray metal poles with a rectangular attachment half-way to the top where there is a capped cylinder.
Public Works Director Mike Barton explained in an email. “It’s called an E-Pole. It is for cellular purposes that the town has required as a minimum for any new cellular attachments to any existing electric distribution pole, street light pole or for stand-alone purposes. There are two more with street lights attached on Rogers Road, one just past the new Starbucks and the other on the Heritage side of the railroad tracks.”
