The city of Meridian is moving closer to adopting a master plan for its busy downtown.   

The city council agreed to give Meridian-based LPK Architects the responsibility to develop the plan at a meeting Tuesday night. The issue was tabled at the council’s last meeting. Council members Kim Houston, George Thomas and Barbara Henson voted in favor of the agreement, while Dustin Markham and Randy Hammon voted against it. 

Mayor Percy Bland said a new master plan for downtown would improve parking, traffic patterns, streetscaping, land usage and more. 

“LPK Architects have done numerous projects for the city in the past,” Bland said. “We need (the master plan) to deal with capacity issues for downtown.”

But Markham said the city should open the bidding for the project up to other firms to make sure the city was spending its money wisely.  

“I think… if it was my money and I was going to spend $93,000, I wouldn’t spend that without getting a second opinion,” Markham said. “I try to look at how we spend the city’s money like how I spend my money – with caution.”

Markham submitted an additional 110 industrial architects for the council to consider via email. He said the council needed to find someone who could give the best value.

“I’m not against the master plan,” Markham emphasized. “I think we need one. I think we need one desperately and I think we should have been turning wheels on this two years ago. I think we should at least issue a (request for proposal) and allow other architects or other individuals to place bids who could possibly provide that service… in a greater capacity or at a lower price.”

Despite Markham’s concerns, the council authorized the agreement with LPK. 

Bland said after the meeting that funding for the actual improvements under the plan would come from the city’s professional services general budget. He said he hoped the project itself would take about six months and coincide with development of other projects downtown. 

LPK Architects also developed plans for the Mississippi Arts and Entertainment Experience, the MSU- Meridian Kinesiology Program and other municipality master plans, according to Bland. 

“It’s very important with what is going on with the Mississippi Arts and Entertainment Experience and with the development of the Threefoot Building,” Bland said. “We wanted someone here, locally, instead of someone that does not know all of the projects we’ve got going on right now.”