A member of the Huntsville city council wants to honor former Mayor Steve Hettinger by naming the under-construction city hall for him.

Kling said it would be a worthy honor for Hettinger, who Kling said “modernized” city hall during his two terms as mayor from 1988-1996 and would be in line with other naming honors bestowed on previous mayors.

Huntsville’s new $80 million city hall is scheduled to open next year across Fountain Circle from the current city hall.

Kling’s idea, though, is a long way from coming to fruition. The councilman said he did not immediately know of any other city halls that have been named for people. None of the city halls in Alabama’s 10 largest cities are named for someone. And, of course, there would have to be majority support of the city council.

There is also the matter of the 2017 Alabama Memorial Preservation Act, which sets standards to protect historically significant structures. To address that issue, the council last week approved Kling’s resolution to seek an opinion from the state attorney general’s office about naming a public building – using the new city hall as an example – after a “former mayor/legislator” with regard to the preservation act.

The resolution itself, however, states that “one or more councilpersons have expressed interest in naming the new city hall and/or public buildings after individual(s) who have served the city or otherwise distinguished themselves.”

Among the questions to be submitted to the attorney general’s office is if the city can name a building for someone knowing that at some point, that building may need to be modified in an expansion or eventually demolished.

“I’m just trying to find out before the fact,” Kling said of the inquiry to the attorney general.

Kling, the longest-serving member of the council, was elected to office in 1988 during Hettinger’s first term as mayor.

“Steve came in and kind of did a lot of modernization things that we have,” Kling said. “He created the the (1990 Capital Improvement Plan that’s still in use). He created a finance director to separate the city clerk and finance into two separate positions so that one person would not basically have the power for signing all documents and signing all checks without any checks and balances.”

Kling also credited Hettinger with starting the city’s long-range planning department.

Hettinger, an aerospace engineer before being elected as mayor, attributed improvements to the vision of his administration and not just himself.

“He said something to me about that,” Hettinger said. “And I said, ‘Bill, I’m certainly honored with anything.’ But it’s really an administration, not an individual. He started about same time as me and I think he understands that we brought a lot of technology to city government that because of my background. Huntsville had been there for a long time and done things one way and so we brought some new things in. But I thought that was really nice of him.”

In 2020, the city named a new road in John Hunt Park as well as a new entrance to the park off Memorial Parkway for Hettinger. That resolution, approved by the council, credited Hettinger with the vision for what became John Hunt Park, stating that he “published the first master plan for development of the former airport property into Huntsville’s largest urban park.”

At the same time, a road was named for Alex McAllister, the city’s longest-serving mayor, in the park. The city-owned stadium in the park built during the mayoral tenure of Joe Davis is named for him.

And earlier this year, at Kling’s proposal, the city’s championship soccer complex that hosts the Alabama high school championships each year, was named for Loretta Spencer, who immediately preceded current Mayor Tommy Battle.

“I’m proud of the eight years I was there, and that was the right amount of time to stay,” Hettinger said. “And so I was proud of it but honored that Bill even thought about (naming city hall for him). It’s not something instigated.”