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EDITORS’S NOTE: This is part three of a four-part series on the recent Chamber of Commerce Voices of Leadership luncheon. In order to cover all four participants, we have chosen to break down the event into four articles. Today we will cover comments by Hogansville Mayor Jake Ayers.

During the Voices of Leadership in Government Luncheon held on Monday at the LaGrange-Troup County Chamber of Commerce LaGrange Mayor Jim Arrington, West Point Mayor Steve Tramell and Hogansville Mayor Jake Ayers, along with County Commission Chair Patrick Crews answered questions on a range of topics affecting their communities by moderator Jamey Jackson. Mayor Jake Ayers spoke on behalf of the City of Hogansville.

 

INFRASTRUCTURE

“Hogansville is and has been a small town for a long time, but we have foreseen for a long time growth that is coming. We’ve done a lot of different projects to try to get us where we are now,” Ayers said.

Ayers said the work has been continual, but at nearly every council meeting they are discussing some sort of development and most will require significant infrastructure upgrades and change.

“We recently were able to do what we consider a kind of a finished loop on our water system. We have a new water main that is coming from the city of LaGrange that allows us to service a lot of our residents and people up in the interstate, because these are a lot of, you know, our main industries up there. And we have a new water tank that is online,” Ayers said.

PUBLIC SAFETY

“I’m very proud of our team, Chief Shepherd, specifically our police department. We have a police department, but we do not have an ambulance service or fire. We rely on the county for all of our fire safety,” Ayers said.

“As Hogansville continues to grow, one of our continual conversations, and thankfully, we have a very unified approach to this from our council perspective, is that we want to be on the front end of the growth that is coming down. We don’t want to be reactionary to the things that we already know are happening,” he said. “I think it’s pretty simple. I think you put money into the things that you need to prioritize, and we’re doing our best to give as much funding and support to our police department. Of course, we can partner with the county for our fire services, which is another whole conversation,” Ayers said. “For the last three years in a row, we’ve added new positions for our police department, and like everywhere else, it’s extremely hard and competitive to get good officers to come join your team. I’m proud and thankful  .”

“Hogansville right now is a pretty good place to work. You’re not going to get paid the most, but you’re probably not going to be in a really dire, life-threatening situation on a regular basis and we’ve got a really good team,” he said.

 RECREATION

Ayers echoed some of the comments from County Commission Chair Patrick Crews on the growing polarity of pickleball. Crews previously spoke about the 19-court pickleball complex under construction in LaGrange.

“I think pickleball is the fastest-growing sport in the world. We’ve got a very small pickleball court that also is a tennis court. We have to get really creative up in Hogansville,” Ayers said, comparing it to the 19-court complex.

Hogansville primarily relies on the county for recreation services, so it’s not a big part of the budget. Even so, Ayers said some exciting things are coming for recreation in Hogansville.

“The city just built the first city-funded playground,” Ayers said. “I know this sounds hard to believe, but prior to this year, we did not have a city playground anywhere in the city. Next to the library, there’s a small playground built there, and in front of the school, there was a playground for the elementary school, so that’s always been a situation.”

Families could go to the school playground when kids at the school aren’t playing on the playground but that causes health and safety concerns. Now the public has a safe playground to take their kids to in Hogansville, Ayers said.

“One of my goals, you know, in my tenure as Mayor of Hogansville, is to hopefully have a safe, usable, conducive park that is walkable for almost any corner of the city. One of the great things about Hogansville is that we’re relatively small geographically. So it’s not that hard to believe and dream up the possibility for us to have a part that is within walking distance from anywhere in town,” Ayers said.

“We’ve got some exciting plans in the near future that will come out publicly in partnership with the county to hopefully bring some really awesome facilities,” Ayers added.

THE ROYAL THEATER

Ayers was specifically asked how the city plans to leverage the restored royal theater to drive economic growth and cultural development in Hogansville, and what measures are in place to ensure its sustainability as a community asset.

“We’re super, super proud and excited for the Royal Theater. It’s been a very long project. There are so many people who worked on this project for years prior to my getting into the mayor’s seat. I’m thankful and honored that I get to sit in this role to see it to its completion,” Ayers said.

The renovations are about 95 percent complete, Ayers said. The council recently approved a contract to replace the steeple on the theater.

“There’s always stuff we couldn’t afford to get done, we’re trying to add right now. We had so many great partners, a lot of local partners, private donors, grants from Fox, and grants from the Callaway Foundation. So many people that helped make this project come to life for our community,” Ayers said.

“This is a city-owned and operated facility, and quite frankly, we just don’t know what we don’t know until we learn it. So it’s going to be a long learning process,” Ayers said.

Ayers said they have had several events already, including the two-night holiday show by Peabo Bryson, Ruben Studdard, and Haley Reinhart.

“People came from all over the state to come to our little town to experience this holiday show. That may not sound crazy for LaGrange, because you have things like Sweetland and other things that you had for years. We haven’t had this. opportunity to have a draw for people,” Ayers said.  “We think this is going to be a twofold draw to bring people in as a tourism aspect to our community, as well as something for the community.”