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One year since 'temporary' closure, Mason's Bernard Community Center remains unused • Tennessee Lookout [1]

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Date: 2024-12-09

It’s been a year since the Bernard Community Center — a modest but beloved building in the small town of Mason, Tennessee — has seen any use from members of its namesake community.

The center was a backdrop for birthday parties, family gatherings, senior breakfasts and movie nights in decades past. But since the Fayette County mayor and commission took back control of the building, which sits on county land bought using a community-earned grant, county leaders and community members have yet to reach consensus over the center’s future or the use of the 7.4-acre parcel of land it sits on.

The Bernard Community Center is located about two miles from Ford Motor Company’s 3,300-acre electric truck and battery plant BlueOval City. The project promises to create about 5,800 jobs over the next 10 years, spurring unprecedented growth in a mostly rural enclave of West Tennessee.

Ford has never used the Bernard Community Center, and county officials say it has nothing to do with the center’s closure or new oversight. But community members including former Bernard Community Center Board member Christine Woods say the changes only began after the massive project came to town. They have formed a group called BlueOval Good Neighbors with support from advocacy organization Tennessee for All, and continue to push for a legally binding community benefits agreement with Ford.

Fayette County Mayor Rhea “Skip” Taylor said he temporarily closed the center’s doors in December 2023 to bring the building and land back under proper county oversight after he found out the center board was renting the rest of the land to a local farmer to harvest soybeans and timber that technically belong to the county.

The community center had been using the proceeds from rental of the property along with fundraisers and rental fees from private events to keep the building up and running with little contribution from the county, center leaders have said.

Proposed lease tabled until January

The Fayette County Commission pushed until January consideration of a proposed agreement that would lease the center and about two dozen surrounding parking spaces to the Bernard Community Association.

Taylor said some commissioners want to have it used, but others “don’t like the idea of a county asset being rented out and the county not receiving funds for it.”

There’s also concerns about how the county might control what types of events can be held at the center, he said.

Attempts to reach several county commissioners were unsuccessful. Commissioner Robert Sills said deferring the lease discussion until January will allow more time to gather information.

In the meantime, Taylor said he’s trying to find a way to allow community members to use the center for private events (it’s currently open only to public events with the permission of the mayor’s office).

“If we can work out something where I don’t have to take money and there’s no burden on the county, we may try that for a little while, and then if that works, that may replace a lease or … make it a little bit simpler on them,” he said.

The land remains unused for now, aside from a Sheriff’s substation, but as BlueOval City grows, Taylor said the acreage could be used for a fire station and ambulance service, as well as a training ground for the Sheriff’s Office. Those discussions will come further down the line.

‘It’s just sitting there’

Woods said the community is the only reason the county owns the land to begin with.

“Our side of the story basically is, listen, before BlueOval was even thought of, this particular community, the Bernard Community, was the one that allowed Fayette County to get the grant” to purchase the plot and construct the building.

“The origin of this all started with the Bernard community and the people who have been working with this community center the entire time,” Woods said. “So, if for no other reason (than) thankfulness from what this community did, give us this community center back, totally in our hands.”

Woods, speaking for herself, said she does not support the lease idea, though some members of the center’s board have expressed that they’d rather have something than nothing.

She’d like to see the county split the parcel — 3.5 acres for a fire and EMS station, and 3.5 for the community center, leaving room for it to grow, perhaps including a walking track. But her proposal didn’t find traction.

“The way the (proposed) lease is set up is to favor the county,” she said.

She doesn’t see how the center could sustain itself under the proposed terms. She resigned from the board about two weeks ago, along with some other board members.

Taylor said he’s trying to work something out with the sheriff, county commissioners and the board.

“I didn’t like the way this came off, and as I told some of the members there, I didn’t like the way this happened,” he said. “But now there’s really pretty decent communication back and forth, and … I think when we come out of this, we’ll have a better product, and a lot more folks will enjoy the facility more than they did before.”

Woods is more skeptical. The community used it over the past 20 years, and having to go through the mayor’s office to schedule events isn’t the same.

“With it being ran by people who live in the community, where they could ask questions and felt comfortable, they used it,” she said. “But at this point … it’s been under the mayor’s control for a year, and nobody from the community has had one thing there. Not one thing, in a year. So it’s just sitting there.”

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[1] Url: https://tennesseelookout.com/2024/12/09/one-year-since-temporary-closure-masons-bernard-community-center-remains-unused/

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