A plan for the county to purchase a former bank branch to serve as a new visitors center has run into a bit of a delay in its estimated time of arrival.
During their latest regularly-scheduled meeting on Tuesday, Ala-mance County’s commissioners agreed to temporarily postpone the proposed acquisition of this Victorian residence at 141 South Main Street in Graham which, until 2024, had served as a branch office for Bank of America.
The commissioners were originally scheduled to firm up this transaction that morning using $650,000 in funds from the Alamance County Visitors Bureau. Under the terms of this deal, the county would lease the property back to the visitors bureau while granting the bank’s customers continued access to the drive-thru ATM for at least another five years.
The visitors bureau would, in the meantime, set up a new welcome center within the 147-year-old edifice, which had once served as the family home to a daughter of local industrialist E.M. Holt.
The visitors bureau’s plan to repurpose this building comes on heels of a decision by bank of America to close this particular branch office, which ceased operations – apart from its drive-thru ATM – in 2024.
During Tuesday’s proceedings, Steve Carter, the vice chairman of Alamance Commissioners, that some procedural hang ups have prevented this building’s proposed acquisition from getting an immediate hearing before the commissioners.
“We haven’t gotten all the information yet that we’re looking for from Bank of America,” Carter acknowledged before the commissioners unanimously agreed to take the matter back up when they reconvene on September 15.
The commissioners rounded out Tuesday’s meeting with a closed session about the proposed purchase of property from trustee Bruce Cameron to expand the buffer around Alamance County’s landfill and provide additional space for passive recreation.
The commissioners used this 10-minute conclave to issue instructions to staff regarding the roughly 1,100 acres that Cameron manages on the landfill’s periphery.
