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Commissioners debate buying CBTX bank building for elections and storage; motion to buy fails for lack of second
Summary
A lengthy workshop on county facilities centered on a potential purchase of the former Commercial Bank of Texas building for election operations and storage. Residents and election volunteers urged purchase; a motion to accept the seller's $350,000 offer with a $125,000 partial donation died for lack of a second.
Anderson County commissioners spent more than two hours in a facilities workshop reviewing county space needs and a potential purchase offer for the former Commercial Bank of Texas building at 412 E. Lacey St.
The bank property, offered to the county with a partial donation, was presented to the court as a possible home for expanded election operations, training and equipment storage. County staff and the elections administrator described how moving election machines out of the jail-cell storage currently used would free up multipurpose rooms for community use and reduce the need to pack and unpack equipment around elections.
Public commenters supported the purchase. Lorraine Bacon, a longtime volunteer, said the building's ground-floor drive-through, shallower ramp and interior layout would be more accessible to older voters and poll workers. "It is an opportunity," Bacon told the court. "You can turn around and rent it easily." Another resident, David Tucker, said the county should look to the future rather than rely on existing, sometimes underused space in the annex.
Judge and county staff walked the court through the annex layout, noting secure rooms, record storage, the server and dispatch rooms, and emergency operations functions. The judge and elections administrator discussed tradeoffs of relocating equipment and whether the annex's current secured spaces could be rearranged instead of buying new property.
Commissioners raised fiscal and operational concerns. One commissioner told the court he prefers maximizing use of current square footage and noted monthly overheads tied to new space: electricity, water and maintenance. Another questioned whether county staff had walked every room and proposed focusing on more efficient storage systems before buying new real estate.
At the end of the workshop a motion to accept Commercial Bank of Texas's offer — a $350,000 cash price after a $125,000 donation from the seller — was made, but the motion died for lack of a second.
Ending: With no second to the motion, the court took no action on the bank-building offer; the workshop record shows both support and sizable fiscal caution among commissioners and members of the public. County staff said they would not move forward with purchase paperwork unless the court placed the item on a future agenda and approved funding.
