Fayetteville is taking another step toward finishing the long‑running renovation of the Market House, approving a construction contract on Monday that will allow crews to complete the pedestrian, accessibility, and stormwater upgrades around the landmark.
The unanimous 10-0 vote also shifts existing city funds to cover the remaining work, a procedural move but one that clears the way for the next phase of improvements around Market Square.
The project has stretched across years, slowed by structural surprises, design complications, and the scrutiny that comes with renovating a building many residents see as both a historic icon and a symbol of racial injustice.
The council’s discussion on Monday reflected that tension, blending technical updates with questions about how the city will tell the history of the Market House.
Why the Project Stalled
Councilmember Lynne Greene pulled the item from the consent agenda—which is when the council groups together routine items on its meeting agenda to be approved in a single vote without discussion—to ask staff why the work has taken so long.
City staff described the delays as a mix of unexpected structural failures, complex design work, and historic‑review red tape.
The first phase of construction began in May 2025, when a historic‑preservation contractor started replacing deteriorated wood, roof supports, and copper roofing, and refaced the tower clocks.
City Manager Doug Hewett said crews discovered “unexpected and significant repairs” once they opened up the structure.
Parks and Recreation Director Michael Gibson put it more bluntly: “When we started digging into it, there was some significant rotten wood. The structure was basically sound, but I don’t know how much more she could have taken.”
The stormwater work, meanwhile, required “significant in design time,” Hewett said.
Separately, the project’s overall design had to move through both the State Historic Preservation Office and the city’s Historic Resources Commission, adding roughly three months to the schedule.
Built in 1832 after a fire destroyed Fayetteville’s first courthouse and market, the two‑story brick Market House is a National Historic Landmark and one of North Carolina’s most photographed civic buildings, according to the city.
Its architecture is unique in the state—one of the few structures in the country that uses the town‑hall‑over‑market design common in England, according to National Register of Historic Places records. Some historians, according to the records, also believe the building was used by the General Assembly from 1788 to 1793, when Fayetteville briefly served as North Carolina’s capital. The site was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1970.
The site has also long been a source of controversy: later research uncovered 18th‑ and 19th‑century documents referring to the Market House as the “slave market,” a history that continues to shape public debate around the landmark.
What the New Phase Includes
The city is now deep into a four‑phase repurposing plan approved in 2022—a plan shaped through community feedback and input from multiple city departments.
The effort is funded through a $1.5 million state grant and is intended to shift the Market House from a static monument into a venue for historical information and multicultural exhibits and activities.
The city is currently in phase three, focused on pedestrian and streetscape improvements.
The previous phase brought new LED lighting capable of illuminating the landmark in different colors for community recognitions. The final phase, scheduled later this year, will install interactive kiosks featuring historical information about Fayetteville and the Market House.
Assistant Public Services Director Byron Reeves said the city is now focused on reshaping how people move around the Market House. The brick plaza will be expanded into the lane where the Black Lives Do Matter striping currently sits, extending the pedestrian feel of the square.
All four approaches—Hay, Green, Person, and Gillespie streets—will receive new pedestrian islands and high‑visibility crosswalks.
Two new brick‑paved crosswalks will lead directly to the Market House. One of them, from the Hay Street side, will connect to a new ADA‑compliant ramp, giving wheelchair users a safe, direct route to the building for the first time.
“The only way for somebody in a wheelchair to get to the Market House is to go through traffic essentially with no crosswalks or anything,” Reeves said.
On Monday, the council awarded a $648,519.20 contract to Morgan Trucking & General Construction of Brunswick County to complete the pedestrian improvements.
Stormwater upgrades will follow, including new inlets around the building and paving once the underground work is complete.
A Painful Symbol
Councilmember Shaun McMillan used the discussion to revisit deeper tensions around the Market House. He recalled standing outside City Hall in 2020 with “hundreds of other people” and pastors urging council to remove the structure because of its ties to systemic injustice and the slave trade. During a protest in May 2020, two people set the structure on fire during a protest in the wake of the George Floyd killing.
McMillan said many residents still see the Market House as a painful symbol and want to ensure the story told there reflects “all of Fayetteville” and the city’s ongoing work toward “liberation and eradication of systemic injustice.”
His central question was asking how residents can influence what symbols, words, and historical framing appear on the new interactive kiosks planned for the final phase.
Hewett said he will ask Human Relations Director Yamile Nazar to prepare a report outlining how the city can tell an “accurate and sensitive, but accurate” history of the Market House and its past uses.
Government reporter Rachel Heimann Mercader can be reached at rheimann@cityviewnc.com or 910-988-8045.
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