Senior citizen advocates who have been working for years to build a permanent senior center in Fayetteville may have their goal in sight.

Fayette County officials will be working over the next month to give the senior advocates one key component of their plan a place to build.

"With this time window that we've been given tonight, we hope to be able to initiate some serious discussion after the first of the year," said Andy Carden, director of Fayette Senior Services, following action by the Fayette County Commission.

Commissioners unanimously agreed to restore a $25,000 a year payment to help fund the building program. After about five years of setting aside the funds, commissioners stopped the payments three years ago.

As part of his motion to restore the payments, Commissioner Herb Frady included a mandate, suggested by commission Chairman Robert Sprayberry, that the county identify land that FSS can use for the new center within 30 to 60 days.

"This way they can go ahead and start the master planning knowing that the land is going to be coming to them," said Sprayberry.

Identifying the land for the center, probably about four or five acres, is dependent on the planning for a new jail and judicial complex, currently under way.

County officials have hoped for some time now to carve out a niche for the senior center among the 33 acres available for the judicial complex. Commissioners named Facility Justice Group Inc. to firm up plans for the jail portion of the complex.

Once it's known how the jail will fit into the judicial complex configured earlier by architects Summerour and Associates, officials will know what land will be left over for the senior center.

Carden said as soon as the senior organization can count on the land, its members can get busy making definite plans for the new center. The current senior center, at 390 Lee St. , is too small for the services FSS offers, he said.

FSS moved into the 3,300-sq. ft. house soon after it organized about 20 years ago, and members of the group have been working toward the hope of a permanent facility ever since then, Carden said.

Tentatively, the service organization hopes for about a 13,000-sq. ft. facility where it can serve both active and less active seniors. Such a facility could cost $1.5 million to $2 million or more, depending upon how elaborate the FSS board of directors elects to make it, he said.

As soon as the site is identified, Carden said, the board will hire an architect to draw a rendering and begin working to develop a partnership with the county so it can present its plans to the federal Department of Community Affairs in hopes of receiving a block grant of up to $500,000.