CURRITUCK — Even as officials prepare for a pre-May 1 opening, the chairman of the Currituck Board of Commissioners and members of the county Tourism Advisory Board continue to be at odds over a proposed welcome center in Moyock.

The tourism advisory board learned Monday night that commission Chairman Barry Nelms and other commissioners have altered the design of several offices planned for the welcome center. Board members also learned that Nelms recently hired a local cabinet maker, Dave Hoppe, to build a receptionist desk for the center different from one they had endorsed.

Thayer Design Inc., the architectural firm hired by the advisory board, designed the welcome center to have two offices inside the proposed welcome center, a former car dealership the county recently purchased. But the plan commissioners have developed doesn't include the offices. Instead the offices might be built as part of an extension to the building that would also include more rest-room facilities, County Manager Dan Scanlon told advisory board members Monday.

"The board (of commissioners) felt strongly we need to preserve as much open floor space as we can," Scanlon said.

Thayer Design Inc. had also proposed the center to have white laminate furniture with green countertops. Hoppe is installing a wood receptionist desk larger than the one Thayer designed. The desk will have a granite top and include space in the middle to make room for a large palm tree that was part of the original car dealership. Thayer's design didn't include the tree.

Advisory board member Vivian Simpson questioned why the large palm tree would remain inside the welcome center if open space was a paramount concern.

Nelms, who is a member of the advisory board, said it was kept because it blends in with the landscaping in the front of the building, and could compliment an interior section that will feature Outer Banks attractions. He also said commissioners consider the tree an asset to the building.

"(The tree) was kept because it is viewed as an asset, a very expensive asset that was included in the price of the building," he said. "It's going to stay."

Monday wasn't the first time Nelms and advisory board members have disagreed about the welcome center's design. The commission chairman irritated several members recently when he hired a Florida firm to design a sign for the center featuring two geese, the informal logo on county documents.

Tourism members wanted the sign to feature the county's branded tourism logo, which includes images of a sailboat, a sun, a shell, and a starfish.

Following Monday's meeting, advisory board member Krisa Boughey said it seems as though interior work to the center is being done on a piecemeal basis. She said it would be better to complete the work as part of a bidded package.

State law does not require Currituck to bid renovation work unless the dollar amount exceeds $90,000.

County Commissioner Owen Etheridge, who sat in the audience during Monday night's meeting, said he favors informal bids for the project.

Etheridge said commissioners have discussed changes to the center's office space but only informally. He noted that the state law granting Currituck's Board of Commissioners status as the county's official tourism authority requires the full board to make decisions.

"All I can say is I have not been made privy to any of what is going on," Etheridge said, referring to Nelms' hiring of Hoppe.

Advisory board member John Wright said after Monday night's meeting that he is just glad the visitors' center will be built.

"I want people to come in and see it. I want them to stop and get a good first look of the county," he said.

Wright suggested that the tourism board's differences with Nelms over the center's design is more than just petty grumbling.

We want it to look good," he said. "They are little minor disagreements (about how the interior should look), but they are important, because it is what we (the advisory board) are here to do."