CULLMAN, Ala. – The Tribune reached out to mayors of all Cullman County municipalities to hear what they feel were the highlights in their communities in 2020, as well as what residents can look forward to this year.
Carla Hart, Holly Pond
Highlights of 2020: “I didn’t become mayor until November, but I know we’ve got some things submitted that’s hopefully coming through – grants that were written, approval for the senior center- and I just think it’s been a prosperous year. We did some road repairs, but you know a lot couldn’t go on. We couldn’t have our ball season or stuff like that to bring in money for the town or the parks, but we weren’t totally shut down.”
Hopes for 2021: “We have three years to get our new building up for the seniors and stuff that we got the grant for, so we’re hoping to get started working on that. Hopefully getting a little more road work done since we applied for the Rebuild Alabama Act, and we’re waiting to hear back on that. I’d also like to work with our ballparks area and the grounds and some land we’ve accumulated in the past few months, get to work on getting that land cleared.”
Patrick Bates, Berlin
Highlights of 2020: “It’s tough to pick out the highlights of the year with how much we’ve all been set back by COVID issues. I guess the highlights for us would be the establishment of the town hall and breaking ground on the new farmers’ market.”
Hopes for 2021: “We’re looking forward to getting our first road resurfacing project completed, and also continuing to grow the farmers’ market!”
Radginal Dodson, Vinemont
Highlights of 2020: “We established the walking trail in 2000, and it took until 2019-2020 to get a pavilion that was approved way back when the walking trail was built. But we got that built, and it’s open to the public. The walking trail also now has a disc golf course. Other than that, we solved some water handling problems over at the complex, we’ve had businesses expand in the city and we’ve got a new deli open a couple days a week serving lunch. We couldn’t do too much without ball complex or our community center, but we’re hanging in there like the rest of the towns.”
Hopes for 2021: “We would like to get our ball complex back and running like normal, and doing that really depends on COVID. As it stands right now, we’ll be delayed getting started but hopefully not too long. For us, ball games are several teams – between 20-30 teams – playing all weekend, and we’d like to get back to around that point. We may not get there, but we would like to try. That’ll be the number one thing I’m looking forward to this summer.”
Kenneth Nail, Hanceville
Highlights of 2020: “One big thing for us is the continuous upgrade of our civic center. It’s really looking nice, and we’ve really turned it more into a venue-type center for weddings and reunions and stuff like that that we can really be proud of. Of course, you’ve got the partial grant we received for the senior citizens building, but that fell a bit short so we’re still in the process of finding a way to come up with about $120,000. We’ve done some bigger projects of drainage work in front of Warehouse Discount Groceries, which has really changed the area outside of WDG and Wallace State. That may not sound like a lot, but for the nine guys we have in Public Works it’s a lot to accomplish.”
Hopes for 2021: “COVID being over. That’s what I’m looking forward to – being able to sponsor a mask burning party once all this is over and done. My wife’s a travel nurse so I may be wishing her out of a job, but I’m sure somewhere will still need her.”
Tim Eskew, Garden City
Highlights of 2020: “We have two people who are wastewater-certified on staff now. The enrollment at Head Start is pretty good right now, and everything’s been going the way we want it to go. Everything we could do around the virus went pretty much according to plan, but nothing really went above and beyond, and we’re just hoping everyone ha(d) a healthy and happy holiday.”
Hopes for 2021: “We’ve had pretty much the same problems everybody else had dealing with the virus and trying to keep all of our employees healthy, and I guess until we all get the vaccine then that’ll be our outlook – just trying to keep going, keep all of our employees healthy during the new year, keep all of the services going for the citizens. The new fire truck should be in once they get the emergency lights, and we’re gonna try to do some work on the water lines this next year. We’re hoping to expand membership in the fire department. We may be looking into doing some upgrades on our sewer system this year.”
Jerry Bartlett, Good Hope
Highlights of 2020: “We purchased 33 acres of land next to our property here with some plans of applying for a grant, which we’ll be applying for the third week in January. Our hopes after acquiring that land is to eventually have 3.1 miles of trails with a splashpad and walking trails and a place for our cross-country team. We also want to have a three-quarter mile paved trail near the splashpad and some pavilions out there. All of this is a work in progress and will be done according to if and when we get the grant. Toward the end of this year, we’ve also seen a lot of interest in the property around our (County Road) 222 exit, so we’re hoping that next year will really be a breakout year for our Exit 305.”
Hopes for 2021: “The park is probably the biggest thing we’re looking forward to. We’re the fastest-growing municipality in Cullman County, so we’re having to try to keep up and balance adding more workforce as we grow. We’re also going to replace the lights on the 304 Exit with all LED – the council gave the approval to place the order and they should be here around the middle to end of January, so we’ll get those put up as soon as they come in if weather allows. That’s going to help our businesses on the Exit 304 and really brighten that exit up. A lot of people wanna know why we don’t light up 305, and it’s simply because this is going to be over a million-dollar project. We just don’t have anything out there right now, but hopefully we’ll get something out there pretty soon that will warrant getting a grant to light it up also.”
Gerald Schafer, West Point
Highlights of 2020: “2020 has been a year like I’ve never seen before, and probably nobody else has either, but this is a wonderful community to live in out here. We’ve got a great school and many community-minded people. The Town has been very conservative with taxpayer money, and this past year we paved about 2 miles on County Road 1141 that’s within the town. We painted and upgraded the restrooms at the town park with new stalls, touchless toilets and urinals and touchless faucets. We had the inside of the town hall and senior center painted, new countertops and tables and chairs, touchless toilets and faucets and all that. We paved the area around the storm shelter, added some streetlights and upgraded others and had new town signs put up. We’re also doing well financially out here – we ended the year with zero debt.”
Hopes for 2021: “We still need to replace the town sign up on (U.S. Highway) 157, so we’re hoping to do that this year. We’re also planning on paving the town’s portion of County Road 1246. We don’t know what 2021 will bring, but with the Good Lord’s help we’re going to continue making improvements to the town and the quality of life out here.”
Windell Calloway, Baileyton
Highlights of 2020: “We didn’t take office until November, so we got a bit behind where other people who got re-elected may be. In October, our new council got with our fire department and they had a drive-thru Halloween. They were kind enough to let us in on that, and we were happy to help out with that. We had a drive-thru Christmas this year with them, too, and they were kind enough to let us use their building since we can’t hold it inside due to the pandemic. A lot of people in town and also out of town donated gifts; we’ve always bought them in the past, and I don’t know what happened to them, but we had people who donated so we were able to give the kids presents. We opened our park back up, and we’re trying to really get it going again. We’ve been working on our equipment and trying to get it back in working shape so we can hopefully have a baseball season this coming year. We’re also hoping to open our new town hall before long, so we’ve been purchasing new things we need for it – computers and wiring and such. The budget is another thing we’ve been working on – we’ve got six years’ worth of audits to catch up on!”
Hopes for 2021: “It’s been a pretty good two months, but (I’m glad that) 2020 is gone! But really, we’re going to be working on building relationships with our community. We’ve got some work that our school asked us to do, so we’re going to try to get that done as soon as they get everything lined up. The fire department and the town council are talking about having a day in the park this summer, so we’re looking forward to that. Hopefully if everything works out, we’ll have a lot more things in our park to get people to come and bring their kids just to walk around and play.”
Woody Jacobs, Cullman
Highlights of 2020: “Coronavirus is a double-edged sword – obviously, that was the big thing for the entire year, but I’m also really proud of the way everyone came together to handle it. Other highlights of the year would be getting the grant for Highway 157 – it was a very big deal being able to open that back up – and then completing both of our bridge projects and getting people moving again on that. Then there’s always our Christmas lights – we love seeing our downtown lit up for the holidays.”
Hopes for 2021: “We won’t be through with 157. I hate to say that, but it’ll take a bit longer. We’re looking forward to completing the Nesmith Park splashpad and playground area and ball fields- very excited for that. Those are our main projects we’ve got coming up.
Reporter’s note: The Tribune attempted to reach all Cullman County mayors for this piece. Unfortunately, we were unable to contact Colony Mayor Curtis Johnson, Dodge City Mayor Tawana Canada and Fairview Mayor Keith Henry.
Copyright 2021 Humble Roots, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
