Arches no more, Charles City City Hall renovations progressing on schedule

By Travis Fischer, tkfischer@charlescitypress.com

Charles City Hall is barely recognizable as construction crews continue to chip away at the building as part of a major renovation project.

Last week the demolition of the building hit a milestone with the removal of the iconic arches that lined the exterior of the building’s front.

“Once the arches come out then they’ll start putting the footings in for the outside wall,” said Mayor Dean Andrews, who took a tour of the building last week to see how the demolition was progressing. “I think the next big thing will be putting those beams in and then starting to build that wall.”

The footings for the building are a recent change in the renovation plans as it was discovered during demolition that the foundation was filled with much more sand than was supposed to be there.

“The new footings will be just outside the footprint of the building,” said Andrews. “There’s more solid dirt there.”

Inside the building, the basic layout of the walls is still largely recognizable, but just about everything from the floor to the ceiling has been taken out.

“It’s just kind of bare inside right now,” said Andrews. “The biggest change is in the council chambers because they tore out that dais.”

Once adorned with carpet and wood paneling, the chambers are now an empty concrete room with a mound of dirt where the city council used to conduct city business. If all goes as scheduled though, by this time next year the council will return to a newly renovated, and more accessible, chambers.

“The new dais will be about half as tall as the old one,” said Andrews.”

The City Hall office staff and Police Department vacated the building early this year and will be utilizing temporary locations for the duration of the renovation project, which is expected to be complete in mid-2026.

Sandy complications aside, city staff and contractors alike seem to be happy with how things are progressing.

“I think they’re pretty pleased with how things are going so far,” said Andrews.