By Shannon McFarlin News Director
Paris, Tenn.–“These are exciting times for our county,” County Mayor Randy Geiger said at Friday afternoon’s groundbreaking for the new Henry County Government Center. “There’s a lot happening here right now.”
Geiger, Commissioner Marty Visser (chairman of the building and grounds committee), TLM Architect Jerry Hartsfield, and TLM Architectural Designer Christi Boone spoke at the ceremonies, while commissioners and officials whose offices will be moving into the new government center wielded the golden shovels to officially break ground at the new 20,245 square foot facility on Hwy. 79S.
Geiger said, “There are a lot of folks who were a part of this. One of my campaign promises as County Mayor was to address our building and space issues. This is a huge thing for us to address the courthouse annex issues and move these offices to a new facility. I think we have the best county officials in the state and all of them have received awards from their state organizations. We appreciate what they do and they deserve to have the resources they need to do their job. This building goes a long way to doing that…We recognize this is an important step for Henry County.”
Geiger also thanked County Maintenance Supervisor John McElroy, the county CFO Pat Hollingsworth and her staff and County Administrative Assistant Jennifer Gallimore.
The new government center will house the offices of County Trustee Randi French, County Clerk Donna Craig, County Assessor Scott Morrison, County Register of Deeds Pam Martin, mayor’s office, multi-purpose meeting room, and budget offices.
Visser said the building and grounds committee started work in earnest on the building problems facing the county (deteriorating, aging buildings and space problems) in 2024 and one of the biggest problems was “how to get the people out of the annex” which has greatly deteriorated.
Former County Mayor John Penn Ridgeway “started this with purchasing this land.” Visser thanked Geiger for his work. “I know it’s been tough with the commission you have sometimes” but a lot of work has gone into the project over the past couple of years.
Hartsfield provided a timeline on the project, noting that Allen Searcy of Union City was low bidder at $7,808,300 “and that includes everything, including the furniture”.
Boone said she has worked on numerous other projects “but this one is my favorite”, citing the working relationships that have been developed with the county officials. TLM is proud to be able to “bring all of the county together in one place” with the project. “And Randy is right: You do have really great county officials.”
Photo: County officials break ground Friday afternoon. Shannon McFarlin photo.