CRAWFORD — In an old auditorium where children eat free lunch during the summer, there’s a hole in the roof big enough to throw a baseball through.
Below the hole in the roof, where the rainwater pours in, there’s a hole in the floor where the wooden planks of the auditorium stage have rotted away.
All that stands between students participating in the Lowndes County School District’s summertime lunch program and the weakened stage floor, are two cinder blocks, turned on their ends, 10 feet apart with a single length of rope hanging limply in between.
The holes aren’t the only problems at the Crawford Community ‘Center. The building, a former school, was built in 1957, and it shows.
The walls are coated in either mold or cracked, peeling paint. Electrical wires hang from the rafters, where an aluminum foil air conditioning duct snakes through the only two rooms with heating and air conditioning.
The rest of the school is walled off.
Floor tiles alternately curl up or down due to water damage where the floor meets the walls. Doors are missing knobs. A musty odor wafts through the building.
The windows facing Martin Luther King Jr. Drive are boarded up. Others in the senior room are covered with tape and clear or black plastic.
The one thing everybody agrees on when it comes to the Crawford Community Center is that it’s in deplorable shape. Most agree it should be condemned and demolished. But that’s where the agreement ends.
The Crawford Community Center is at the middle of a minor political controversy. It’s not a front-and-center issue, but it’s one that has been around for years.
It popped up again Oct. 15 when a contingent from Crawford visited the Lowndes County Board of Supervisors meeting to request something be done about the dilapidated building where seniors convene four days a week.
“Not only are our elderly breathing in mold and mildew, but if they hold that (Nov. 2 general) election there, the general public will be exposed,” said Gwen King, a concerned Crawford citizen who addressed the board.
King and other Crawford community members feel as though the supervisors left them out when the board finalized a list of parks and recreation projects to be completed in the coming years. Lowndes County and Columbus each agreed to chip in $850,000 to the Columbus-Lowndes Recreation Authority to fund the projects, but a new community center for Crawford didn’t make the cut.
However, Crawford wasn’t completely ignored. CLRA Director Roger Short said a church expressed interest in purchasing the building around the time the park and recreation project list was being finalized, prompting the CLRA to draw up plans for a brand new facility. One plan involved the demolition of the current building and erecting a new 3,000-square-foot facility. Another called for an addition to the gym at the Crawford Community Center, which is newer and in better shape despite having only one of four heating and cooling units operational.
Unfortunately, the deal with the church fell through, leaving the CLRA short of funds to initiate either project. At that point the Charles Brown Gym on Ninth Street South in Columbus had already been chosen by the board as District 4’s recipient for the recreation funds. District 4 also includes Crawford, which has a population of 655, according to the 2000 Census.
An unlikely promise?
To appease the Crawford contingent attending the Oct. 15 board meeting, the supervisors promised to funnel any funds remaining from a pending $7.75 million bond issue to the community center project.
The bond issue is intended to pay for renovating the Lowndes County Courthouse, construction of a new justice court building and the Burns Bottom soccer complex in Columbus and paying off the remaining balance from the construction of the Lowndes County Adult Detention Center.
But the question is: Will any money be left?
District 5 Supervisor Leroy Brooks delivered an impassioned plea to the board that it not patronize the citizens of Crawford, giving them false hope for funds he doesn’t expect the county to have.
“I don’t anticipate (surplus funds). To approach it that way is unfair,” said Brooks Thursday.
Furthermore, he says the bond issue projects could take up to two years to complete. And by that time a new board of supervisors could be voted in which may not honor the promise.
District 1 Supervisor and Board President Harry Sanders insists Crawford has reason to keep hope alive.
“There could easily be money left over in that. If the bids come in cheap like (the cost to build) the health department, there will be some left over. Leroy and Jeff are making this a political issue,” said Sanders.
Neighborhood parks plan
The town of Artesia (population 498) in District 5 is often included with Crawford in discussions of recreation needs, despite receiving a new $125,000, 3,000-square-foot community center 10 years ago. Sanders claims Brooks and District 4 Supervisor Jeff Smith each had the opportunity to choose a project in the county rather than in city limits.
“They had a legitimate opportunity to put both of those towns in there. I did Anderson Grove and (District 3 Supervisor) John Holliman did New Hope,” said Sanders.
Smith and Brooks maintain they had no autonomous choice regarding which facilities in their districts would receive attention.
“At no point was there an option on the table to choose one site or another. It was agreed upon by the city and the county to allow (the CLRA) to bring us back their final recommendations,” said Smith.
Both the Columbus City Council and Lowndes County Board of Supervisors voted separately around the beginning of the year to approve the CLRA project list. The two boards held joint meetings prior, at which each member had the chance offer input.
Smith said he voted to accept the list excluding Crawford with the understanding the project would be revisited at a later date. Short says some surplus funds may remain after all the recreation projects are completed, but the city and county would have to agree on how to spend those funds.
Interest money option
Brooks proposes interest from the $30 million the county received from the sale of Baptist Memorial Hospital-Golden Triangle be used to fund a community center in Crawford. Lowndes County accrued $750,000 in interest this year.
The problem with that, according to Sanders, is that this year’s interest is already tied up in road projects. And not all supervisors are open to the idea of spending those funds on recreation.
“I’m not going to dip into the hospital money for that. That’s for emergency reasons,” said District 2 Supervisor Frank Ferguson. “As much as I’d like to give them a center, I don’t consider that an emergency.”
Holliman said he’d consider voting to spend some of the hospital interest funds on a community center.
Smith is looking into multiple sources to determine the best route for the county, but has no doubt the community center can be funded.
“It’s not a question of whether we can do it. It’s a question of whether we will do it. So we don’t have to wait on the bond money to see,” he said.
Looking forward
In the meantime, Brooks suggested the town work with a planner or an architect to begin drawing up concrete plans to present to the board rather than simply presenting a general complaint.
Crawford has already taken a step in that direction, working with Jack Russell, a representative from the Appalachian Regional Commission, to construct a comprehensive community development plan.
A citizen forum produced a wish list, which included a recreation facility, a computer learning center, improved broadband Internet services and improvements in water and sewer services.
Russell and the ARC will also help Crawford develop fundraising efforts aimed at matching grants.
Safety, health concerns
While the supervisors debate and town leaders develop plans, the Crawford Community Center remains a dismal pla
Jason Browne was previously a reporter for The Dispatch.
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