The former Foley National Guard armory, which served the community for more than 50 years, is set to be transformed into a city recreation and office space.

The Foley City Council has approved a $1.88 million contract to renovate the building.

Located at 315 E. Jessamine Ave., behind City Hall, the facility will soon take on a new role in serving the city.

Mayor Ralph Hellmich said the project will create needed space for the Foley Recreation Department and other city offices near City Hall.

“It’s a $2 million rehabilitation to allow our recreational folks and some other departments to be in there,” Hellmich said. “It sounds like a lot of money, but when you do the per dollar, per foot, you’re getting it for one-third the cost of new construction and it’s right there on our campus. It will allow us to have some recreational facilities that we don’t currently have, like a gymnasium, for our kids and for everybody.”

The renovation will provide residents with a new indoor gymnasium, city offices for the Parks and Recreation Department as well as the entire Leisure Services Department. The facility will also include a classroom for recreational programs and senior citizens activities, a climate-controlled space for museum archives and a sensory space for special-needs programming and events.

The gymnasium will include space that can be configured for four pickleball courts, a basketball court or a volleyball court.

Benefits of the gymnasium will include indoor programming for pickleball players and pickup basketball for residents. Uses of the space could also include a court to begin a youth volleyball program, city basketball court for the Foley youth basketball league and space for larger Senior Center recreation classes.

Plans also include a weight room for the Foley Police Department. Officers now use the weight room in the Fire Department building. That facility, however, is near the sleeping quarters for firefighters, which can restrict the times when the weight room can be used.

The main armory building is about 16,000 square feet in size. The site also includes a storage building with about 3,000 square feet of space that is not part of the renovation project.

The armory opened in 1969. It served as the headquarters for the Foley contingent of the Alabama Army National Guard until the unit moved into a new facility near the Foley Beach Express in 2023.

The city donated the land on which the new armory was built. In exchange for the property, the National Guard gave the city the former armory site.