The Hogansville City Council decided against dedicating the Green Avenue basketball park in honor of late Hogansville resident Francis Robinson. Instead, the council voted 4-1 to honor Robinson with a proclamation or key to the city.

Council member Theresa Strickland proposed the counter motion and requested to do whichever of the two options were more appropriate.

Council member Fred Higgins voted against the counter measure.

Before the vote, the council heard from Robinson’s niece, Deann White. Robinson died at 99-years-old on May 8, 2018.

White said Robinson had lived in Hogansville before 1951 and was active in local sports from working in the booster club to concession stands.

“She worked many years at the concession stand at football games,” White said. “She worked concession stand at Hogansville basketball games. She even traveled when they went to championship games.”

White said at the meeting that Robinson had even cheered on Strickland and council member Reginald Jackson at games.

“She taught swimming lessons for 30 years,” White said. “She also taught Sunday school for probably about 50 years. And then she was in the Optimist Club, and they did Easter egg hunts for the children with the police department.”

White said Robinson had also served in the US Army in World War II.

“In 1941 when she was in the army, she played basketball with the traveling team for the Army,” White said. “Not many women served in the military in 1941.”

In a previous city council meeting, Strickland said she had concerns about naming things after people. Jackson said in a previous meeting that he thought they should “associate her with something she had a passion for.”

The basketball court will feature regulation size hoops and is a 88×60-foot concrete pad. The court, along with a court at Pines and Homes Street, is being paid for with leftover Special Purpose Local Options Sales Tax IV.