HPC Meeting Summary 09272023 - Laserfiche WebLink

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b. County-owned historic building updates: Staff provided a PowerPoint overview of the current status of several buildings. There is a future project to fund the overall preservation and repairs of the Old Courthouse, including interior upgrades, scheduled to start in 2026. The project will address structural issues, exterior brickwork and woodwork restoration, and includes enhancements for the landscaping of the entire courthouse square. The latter would involve planning to include public input from various stakeholders about uses of the grounds, which are also a historic cultural landscape. This includes the old WPA-era stone sidewalks around the entire square, as well as the existing trees and other landscape elements. We undertook a full archaeological investigation of the grounds around the courthouse but hit pause during covid. Staff will share this report with members. This project would include interpretive signage inside and out. The county will hire a qualified architect with extensive experience in historic restoration, along with a structural engineer, and a landscape architect/site planner. The HPC will guide this process. Members viewed a PowerPoint of the courthouse and grounds. Staff then discussed the Alexander Dickson House, now the town's visitor center operated by the Alliance. This was moved from its original site where the present-day Walmart is located. Staff showed historical photos and architectural highlights, followed by images of the newly-restored farmhouse and buildings at Blackwood Farm Park. c. Report from SHPO CLG training in Southern Pines: Staff provided a brief summary of topics covered at the CLG training event held by the SHPO on Sept. 25th. Topics included ideas for Preservation Month activities. One HPC showed historic films relating to preservation or history. Discussion followed. Staff offered to arrange for a viewing of the two films by H. Lee Waters showing Hillsborough and Chapel Hill during the 1930s. d. CLG Virtual Training: Staff reminded the members who volunteered that we need to have two members complete the SHPO's virtual training program prior to September 30 in order to maintain our CLG status. A reminder email will be sent with links to the training videos and the form to be used to document what you learned. e. Dates for Field Trip: Staff continues to work with the Courts staff to determine some available time slots that will work for them. The first weekend of November was best for most. Peck asked about the future of the old jail. Staff reported that the jail site is included in the scope of a county-wide facilities planning study now underway. Ideas for this site include tearing the modern parts down and renovating the historic 1926 building. ITEM #6: UPDATES AND INFORMATION ITEMS a. Preservation North Carolina Annual Conference: Dickinson described the upcoming annual conference to be held in Durham; this makes it easy for us to attend. Staff explained that there is some money in the budget to pay for registration to the educational programs and tours; send an email to indicate which sessions you want to attend. b. Moorefields public archaeology day: Noe reported that this has been moved to Sept. 30th. There were some useful discoveries made during the current project. He is willing to provide some visuals for our next meeting, perhaps in December. c. Book Protect: The author is completing her review of our most recent revisions that we did to reduce the word count. The goal is to get a finished manuscript out to the book committee members in October. d. Open air time: No information was shared in the interest of time. ITEM #7: ADJOURNMENT: Meeting adjourned at 8:27 pm. Meeting summary by Peter Sandbeck, DEAPR staff 2