Cornelia will acquire five parcels bordering the land where the new amphitheater and latest city park projects are planned off Grant Place near downtown.
At a regular meeting Tuesday, April 1, following an executive session for real estate, Cornelia commissioners amended the agenda to add an item for the $570,000 purchase of the 2.1-acre property, where multiple warehouses previously owned by Habersham Hardware now sit abandoned.
Funding for the purchase will come from the city’s general fund.
Following Tuesday’s meeting, Cornelia Mayor John Borrow told reporters that while the purchase provides the city room for expansion and opportunity, details or timelines are not yet fully known.
“It makes sense – not only for parking…but this is the time for an increased footprint of that park,” Borrow said. “There may be some sort of future plans, which we don’t even know yet.”
Certain buildings could see eventual demolition, according to Cornelia City Manager Dee Anderson, while some of the brick structures could remain for other potential uses in the years ahead.
“At the corner at Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks, where they’ve already demolished the buildings, we will be repairing the concrete there,” Anderson said. Like Borrow, he added that for now the central objective is to expand parking space as well as the park’s future footprint.
Cornelia City Attorney Steve Campbell described acquisition of the properties as a first step in what could become a long-term plan to develop a vision for that area.
“The railroad owns or controls a lot of the property and the right-of-way in these different areas,” Campbell said. “This is some of the fee simple property…going forward, to have access to that, is going to really allow that park to be what it needs to be.”
Amphitheater, park project
The amphitheater, part of a larger city park project off Grant Place, will eventually have a (outdoor) seating capacity of 5,000 and is funded in part by a $1 million grant from the Appalachian Regional Commission.
Phase I of the project, which includes the park, is estimated at $2.1 million – paid from the grant, SPLOST funding and the city’s general fund. That phase is expected to be completed by December 2025. Phase II is slated for completion in 2026 for $1.5 million from the city’s general fund.
The amphitheater, in its entirety, won’t be finished until early-2027.
