The Poteau Community Building was constructed in 1937 as a Works Progress Administration project during the New Deal — one of hundreds of public buildings built across rural America to provide employment and give small towns lasting civic infrastructure. The building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and represents the stripped classical style typical of WPA public architecture: solid limestone construction, modest ornamentation, built to last.
It stands as a reminder of the Depression era's legacy in southeastern Oklahoma, when federal work programs transformed small towns like Poteau with courthouses, libraries, bridges, and community halls that are still in use today. Combined with the 1926 LeFlore County Courthouse a few blocks away, it gives a sense of the civic ambition that shaped Poteau's downtown in the first half of the twentieth century.