By Michael Butler

Tallassee has a plan to turn the former Hotel Talisi footprint into an event area including a splashpad and stage.

Mayor Joey Wiginton expects the area to begin its transformation in the coming months.

“We’ve got drawings now of what we want it to look like,” Wiginton said, “a splashpad, a stage, a couple of firepits, picnic tables, food trucks on the side. We’d have a big green area with astroturf. We’d be able to do concerts. I want to put a 100-inch TV at the back of the stage, so we can watch football games – just do whatever we want to do and revitalize downtown.”

Wiginton said grants are already being applied for.

“The splashpad is $150,000. We’re talking about a half million for the whole thing, but it’s going to happen – I think within a year.”

The downtown green space is part one of several ideas Wiginton hopes the city can tackle.

“It’s going to be the catalyst for everything else. We can’t do anything down at the 1852 mill and bridge until downtown gets fixed. That’s where people are going to have to park. That’s my dream.”

Wiginton is already getting bids for work at the former westside mill.

“I think we knock the fifth floor off and cap it there. We can put sod in it and have weddings, graduations. On the outside we put lights on the ground shining up. We make that thing glow. That ugly old mill can be a beautiful ruin.

“We’ve got to get a structural engineer to verify the bridge is safe. Then we go out 150 feet and fix the boards and move that gate to the end of that. Then we start a campaign, ‘Would you like to buy a board?’ We extend it out further. We’ve got to do the whole thing. I’m bound and determined before I leave as mayor we’re going to have that bridge done.”