The Lowndes County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday accepted the deeds from donated property it plans to use for a multi-use horse park facility.
The 21.7 acre parcel is located off of Old Highway 82 and Tom Rose Road, just west of the Tombigbee River. It was donated to the county by Jimmy Graham of Grayco Co., and Al Puckett of Brickyard Properties. Barring any unforeseen issues with obtaining a clean title on the property, the county will soon be able to move forward with construction on the site. Originally, the project — a joint effort between the county and the Mississippi State University Extension Service — was to have been built on Golden Triangle Development LINK land near the industrial park.
The new site is preferable to that location, said Reid Nevins of the Extension Service.
“It’s a little closer to town, for one thing,” Nevins said. “But the best thing is, it will mean a lot less dirt work and site preparation. The other location was full of trees and was on the side of a hill, so it would have taken a lot of prep work to get it ready for construction.”
Board president Harry Sanders said he hopes the prep work will begin before the end of the year.
“We would like to have something in progress at the site before the legislature meets again in January,” Sanders said.
During the last legislative session, the state appropriated $1.2 million for the project, about half of the money Sanders said will be needed.
“We believe that the legislature will give us the rest of what we need, about $1.2 million or $1.3 million when they meet again,” Sanders said. “We would like to have some work in progress when the legislature meets.”
Plans call for a roofed, open air pavilion approximately the size of a football field to be used for horse shows, live stock shows, 4H events and other uses, Sanders said. In addition, the project calls for a 5,000 square-foot office complex which would serve as the new home for the Extension Service, 4H office and meeting space.
Sanders said an ATV trail and a pond will be added to allow for classes on ATV safety, pond management, botany and other seminars, workshops or classes the extension service offers.
“We really want this to be a teaching tool for outdoor topics,” Sanders said.
Nevins said while the project won’t be on the scale of the Mississippi Horse Park in Starkville, it will be a great asset to the county.
“It’s going to be first class,” Nevins said. “That’s our intent We want something the county can be proud of.”
In other business
The board approved an extension on the contract for work being done at Mississippi Steel Processing, an expansion the county obtained an Mississippi Development Authority grant to cover. When company officials learned the project would be finished for less than the $173,000 budgeted, they asked for the balance to be used to expand the loading docks at the facility. The additional work will require more time than allowed under the existing plan. Supervisors voted unanimously to grant the extension to allow the work to be completed.
The county also set a time for its budget hearing. That hearing will be held at 9:30 a.m. Tuesday at the courthouse.
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
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