By Malcolm Butler
Residents of Lincoln Parish and the City of Ruston will see a few other old buildings restored and turned into commerce and apartments soon.
Mayor Ronny Walker joined Michael Echols, his wife Christie and his Echo Development team on Friday morning for the ground-breaking ceremony for the Power Water District, a multi-functional development that will restore, rebuild and renew the old diesel power plant and water tank facility located on the corner of Sparta Street and East Mississippi Avenue.
“This is the first piece of several older buildings in our city that are being restored right now,” said Walker. “It’s really a revitalization of old structures in downtown Ruston. These are all historical buildings, and we are so excited that they will be back in commerce.”
The old diesel power plant ran turbines with diesel fuel for decades, and the footprint and facility also include a million gallon water storage facility that is mostly underground. It was the first ever water facility that came to the City of Ruston.
The facilities were shut down more than 20 years ago, according to John Freeman, the city’s Construction Projects Supervisor.
“We appreciate Michael Echols and his wife Christie and their team coming together to do this,” said Walker. “Projects like this take a while. Michael and his team have done some great projects in Monroe and other areas, and we are excited that this will be the center of revitalization on the east side of downtown Ruston.”
According to Walker, the City sold the old facility to Echols and his team seven years ago.
“We have been working on this little project for a number of years,” said Michael Echols. “And without Mayor Walker’s commitment and leadership, we would not be in the place that we are today. When we first got here in 2017 and walked the site, there are some complexities to it.
“These are historic buildings and they take longer to do and come up with how you are going to do what you are going to do. Mike Walpole has been a great champion and really hung with us through this process.”
“This has been a fun projects for our office. Historical projects have their own sets of challenges. One of the requirements of the historical piece of this is you have to make sure it’s recognizable what kind of structure it was before you started,” said Walpole. “We want to make sure we maintain the viability of the buildings. It’s been interesting and a long time coming. We are looking forward to seeing this come to fruition.”
Michael Echols said the entirety of the project would include apartments, restaurants and commercial space.
“We will have two restaurants on this campus,” said Michael Echols. “There will be some commercial square footage that will be for lease for unique types of commercial retailers. The bigger building will be 18 apartments. There is a phase two with another 44 apartments, and a phase three that I’m not going to tell you anything about right now. But it’s special too.”
Christie Echols said the Power Water District project is near and dear to her heart.
“This project is particularly special to me because I went to Louisiana Tech,” said Christie Echols, a Louisiana Tech graduate. “I worked in downtown Ruston at Frothy Monkey Coffee House, and I fell in love with this community so long ago. This is really where the foundation of what I do today started. I am thrilled to be back here fixing up old buildings in my school town.”
To learn more about the Power Water District, go to powerwaterdistrict.com.
