The City of Aberdeen is taking steps to have more direct control of the Aberdeen Museum of History and its future.

At Wednesday’s city council meeting, Aberdeen Mayor Erik Larson said he plans to make a council recommendation to bring the museum under control of the city.

The first step toward that would be to fill the seats for an official city-run museum board.

The city will soon advertise for applicants to join that board, and Larson said he wants to hire a consultant to work on plans for the museum’s revival.

“My intention is to populate the board, get approval from the council to hire a consultant to guide the process of the future of the museum, and to help make a plan moving forward,” he said.

Many of the museum’s exhibitions and artifacts were destroyed in the Armory building’s massive fire last month.

There are seven board member positions open for the new group, and successful applicants would serve three-year terms, Larson said. There would also be city staff to oversee the board. When the board previously existed, it typically met once a month.

In recent years, an independent volunteer group called Friends of the Museum has been the only organization overseeing the museum and its operations. The city contracted out to Friends of the Museum to serve this role.

At a recent Friends of the Museum meeting, a majority of the members said they would be in favor of switching from that group to an official city museum board.

Until the new board is created, Larson said he wants to hold off on having a public meeting focused on ideas for new museum locations.

However, he doesn’t think the burned-out Armory building is suitable for rebuilding, and has said it would be better to relocate.

“I’m hopeful we will come out of this with a positive conclusion to whatever we do with the site where the old community center was, and a brand new museum built somewhere more appropriate,” he said.