Tuesday night the Town of Wake Forest took a significant step toward revitalizing the South White Street downtown by providing an affordable incubator for new businesses called Loading Dock Wake Forest. The town is providing $65,000 from the Wake Forest Business and Industry Partnership funds without touching the Futures Fund.
Loading Dock’s founder and CEO Philip Freeman has arranged for a long-term lease of the former Holding Cotton Company warehouse and office with two acres of land at 525 South White Street now owned by Elizabeth and Bob Johnson. The $65,000 will go toward the pre-paid rent and the services Loading Dock will provide to WFBIP, which include two five-person private offices and 10 memberships that can be made available to future entrepreneurs, as well as training rooms and event spaces and co-branding of programming and events. The memberships, renewed monthly, are offered at a number of price and service levels.
Along with those benefits, Loading Dock when operating will have full internet capabilities, enterprise-level wi-fi, a full service kitchen with Fair Trade coffee, onsite notary, business mail address and mailing services and print, copy and fax capabilities.
Freeman and WFBIP President Jason Cannon said there would be between 125 and 150 new jobs created by the tenants at Loading Dock, which will also spur established downtown businesses to seek new opportunities.
Parking was discussed at length. There is new onstreet parking on both sides of South White Street between Elm Avenue and East Holding Avenue because of the just completed streetscape plan that also created Festival Avenue, also known as East Owen Avenue. Freeman and Clark Rinehardt, director of community at Loading Dock, said only about 20 percent of the tenants would probably be in the building at any one time.
Loading Dock has three Raleigh coworking and collaborative workspace locations; the Wake Forest location will be their first investment outside Raleigh.
The resolution appropriating the funding says Dr. Gerry Hayes, president and CEO of the Wireless Research Center of North Carolina, which got its start thanks to a loan and a grant from the Wake Forest Futures Fund, “enthusiastically supports this project and has pledged both WRC’s and RIoT Labs’ expertise and networks with Loading Dock as they activate in Wake Forest.
Rolesville-Wake Forest Bus Study Ray Boylston with RLS & Associates, who previously lived in Wake Forest for several years, said the first phase of the study is underway. The main questions are the schedule and hours, whether to serve a larger area or target customers, how to connect to Wake Forest’s two loop buses and whether to use Uber or Lyft. He said they should have a final report ready for the two town boards in July.
Mayor Vivian Jones asked about the new Rolesville Express bus to Raleigh which travels on NC 401 and goes by Wake Tech’s northern campus. She wondered if that express could be connected somehow to the Wake Forest loop buses. With Wake Tech now providing free GoPass bus passes for all area buses, it would allow Wake Forest students to commute to Wake Tech for free.
Commissioner Bridget Wall-Lennon questions Boylston about the study area and pointing out that Forestville Road runs out to 401 but there is no public transportation there. For much of its length it has Wake Forest on one side, Rolesville on the other.
Cemetery fees Public Works Director Magda Holloway said the Cemetery Advisory Board had decided it was necessary to increase the fees for burial plots and space in the columbarium where there is room for two urns. “They were trying to keep everything below $1,000,” she said.
The mayor and commissioners decided that was out of touch with the costs at other cemeteries. Wake Forest Cemetery is owned and maintained by the town, the groundskeepers and others who cut the grass, open the burial plots, trim the trees and keep good records of the burials. In recent years the town has made substantial improvements to the cemetery.
Holloway sent a memo to the board: “Currently, we have less than 300 plots and slightly over 100 niches available, with the capabilities of building more niches in the future.” The town will have to buy more land very soon for burials.” Each niche now costs $400.
There have been two levels of pricing for burials, at-need and pre-need. At-need costs town residents $500 while out-of-town residents pay $650. For those planning ahead, town residents pay $450 for each plot while out-of-town residents pay $600.
Ridiculous, said Mayor Jones, that it only costs out-of-town residents a bit more than town residents. “They don’t pay taxes, they don’t pay to keep it up.” She noted that even the cheapest plot in Pine Forest, a private cemetery, is $1,950.
“Out of town funeral homes are calling us when they don’t have a plot,” Holloway said. “Ours are cheaper” than the rates at other cemeteries.
Commissioner Chad Sary’s motion was to change the rates to $600 for burial plots for in-town residents and $1,800 for out-of-town and $900 for columbarium niches for in-town residents with $2,000 for out-of-town. And he added that the new rates should be effective tomorrow with no at-need and pre-need rates.
Commissioner Wall-Lennon balked at the effective date, saying making the new rates effective in two weeks might be better. Sary’s motion passed three to one.
Other actions included:
*approving the route change for Wake Forest two loop buses. The change will take place in May.
*approving the 2020-2021 Capital Improvements Plan Update.
*approving a rezoning from Wake County’s R-30 to general residential 5 for 2.4 acres on Costa Lane.
*hearing from Chuck Hoover with Quilts of Valor who presented Commissioner Jim Dyer with a quilt.
*recognizing the Franklin Academy Men’s 2019 Soccer Team for its 1-A championship.
*Commissioner Liz Simpers was absent.
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