The Brundidge City Council worked off a short agenda Tuesday in order to tour the recently completed annex to the city’s Tupper Lightfoot Memorial Library.

The first order of business was the public hearing held prior to the council’s July 19 meeting to discuss the remediation of the outdoor recreation park that was taken out of service.

Mayor Jimmy Ramage said several good suggestions came out of the meeting and are worth consideration.

The council voted at the July meeting to improve the track at Pike County High School by installing additional lighting and resurfacing the track, which is used by exercise walkers.

The council discussed whether that action would counter the suggestion for a walking trail at another location to remediate the park situation.

Ramage said that the city has 6.95 acres in Ramage Park that may be used as a replacement for the outdoor recreation park that was sold to a Brundidge industry.

“The beauty of that site is that it is on a wooded hillside and would make an ideal walking trail,” Ramage said. “We could add picnic tables and grills and make it a nice outdoor recreation area.”

Councilman Lawrence Bowden suggested that the city develop an overall plan for the area before spending money arbitrarily.

Ramage said the developments could be done in phases with the first one planned to remediate the park problem and then other phases could be implemented in time.

Before continuing the meeting at the library annex, the council voted to hire Esmac Roofing to put a new roof on the former building that housed Dr. Don Golden’s medical practice and is now city property. The cost of the new roof will be $9,600. The roof carries a 15-year warranty.

The council members then toured the Tupper Lightfoot Memorial Library annex on Oak Street, which is almost ready for occupancy.

Britt Thomas, city manager, said plans were, upon completion of the annex, to move in and vacate the original library building for remodeling. However, the computers for the annex will not be delivered until the third week in September.

A delay in the reception of a USDA grant to fund the purchase of the computers turned out to be a good thing, Thomas said.

“While we were waiting for the grant to come through, Auburn University made the computers available to the library – between 15 and 20 at a cost of around $20,000 — so we didn’t need the USDA grant for that purpose,” Thomas said.

“I contacted the USDA and asked if we would be able to purchase a phone system for the library with those funds. And, if we get the request on paper, we should be able to do that.

“We can’t move into the annex without the computers,” Thomas said. “So, we will be delayed a while longer but through the delays, we gotten more bang for our bucks.”