08/02/2004 MINUTES - Laserfiche WebLink

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Planning and Zoning Meeting August 3, 2004 Page 4 of the Commission were unanimous in their decision, six of those nine members are property owners within the district. Troy Elliot, 643 Church Street, new resident in the district, stated that he bought his house in the area for 2 reasons, (1) for historic purposes to teach his son a lesson about the value of his street and (2) as an investment for himself and other members of his family. Mr. Elliot stated that he doesn't quite know what he is doing but trust those people that he knows on the historic commission to lead him in the right direction. Sue Lancaster, who owns a historic house on S. Church spoke in favor of the petition stating that when KPB was started and they were cleaning S. Church and one of the properties was a very dilapidated, historic home that was in very, very bad condition. Many members of the group that was cleaning stated that the house should be torn down. There was something that said "don't pull me down, I'm part of Paris history." Ms. Lancaster contacted the man who bought the house from the family who had lived there since 1887 (the Kirpatrick Family). Ms. Lancaster stated that she purchased the house, much to her husbands alarm, and began to work on it. They worked on the house for 3 years. There is a world of history in that house, a lot of it is being donated to the museum, some of it has gone to Holy Cross because that family attended Holy Cross. Three generations grew up in the house. Elnita Kirpatrick was a reporter for the Dinner Bell which was the forerunner of the Paris News. Ms. Kirpatrick wrote about the Paris Fire from her front steps, that house did not burn. All of her neighbors across the street burned and then it jumped over and got the other end of her Church Street. It was a real labor of love to restore the house and it would have been so easy to have been torn down and a lot of history would have been lost. We have a real unique opportunity here with all the historic buildings. We are sixth in the State of Texas of having historic buildings but they are dropping at an alarming rate. Ms.