DAPHNE — A $6 million purchase approved Monday, Feb. 6, will provide more recreation facilities and bayfront access for residents and visitors in Daphne, city officials said.

The Daphne City Council voted to buy a 10.5-acre site that includes the Thomas Medical Center on U.S. 98 from Gulf Health Hospitals Inc. Most of the cost will come from a $4-million grant through the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act, known as GOMESA.

Councilman Ron Scott said the city's cost will be about $2 million for property that includes an 80,000-square-foot building.

"We have a master plan for all of that as part of our waterfront and I'm excited about the opportunity," Scott said. "That building is some 80,000 square feet I think and at current building costs of some $200, basically, a square foot, the structure itself is some $16 million, so this will be a great start on a great project for the city, long-term."

Mayor Robin LeJeune said the city will lease part of the building back to the medical center for three years as part of the agreement, but Daphne will still have space for parts of the structure.

"There's a lot of space and a lot of office space," LeJeune said. "There's been doctor's offices that have already left so we will be moving some, you know, we'll be using some of the space, but we'll have some doors in place to keep things kind of separate. But we won't be able to do exactly what we want to do for a time period that they're in there. But we are going to actually use some of the space there's a lot of space that's empty, that we can use right away. So there is there is plans to use some of that space."

He said the city signed papers to buy the property on Friday, Feb. 10.

The purchase will allow Daphne to expand Bayfront Park, which is next to the new property and increase public access to the Mobile Bay area, according to city reports. City plans also include a shoreline boardwalk from the park north to Interstate 10.

Future plans also include building a new amphitheater at the park, replacing a structure that was torn down. The city council voted in 2021 to set aside $1 million to pay some of the costs of building a new amphitheater.

The GOMESA program provides money from offshore oil and gas production to states that allow drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.