County commission reviews plans to expand courthouse

Boone County prosecuting attorney Kevin Crane said he would like to hire a new assistant prosecutor to lighten the workload in the office. Although there is funding available for the new position, the prosecuting attorney’s office in the Boone County Courthouse does not have enough space to accommodate another staff member.

Crane also said his office feels the space crunch in other ways. For example, there’s not enough room for prosecutors to meet with crime victims in private areas.

“Sometimes we’ll have to conference with victims out in an open area,” Crane said, which can be especially uncomfortable when the person is a sexual assault victim or a small child and special care is needed.

Thirteenth Circuit Court administrator Kathy Lloyd said a number of departments in the courthouse are feeling the crunch as the community grows and court filings increase, including the public administrator’s office, circuit clerk’s office, juvenile office and alternative sentencing courts.

The Boone County Commission created a Space Needs Committee last fall to determine how to meet the needs of a growing community with a growing need for court services. The committee determined that the courthouse would need more space to accommodate the court’s needs for the next 15 years.

“As our county continues to grow, our court system has to grow with that,” Northern District Commissioner Skip Elkin said.

The Boone County Commission is currently reviewing plans to add two floors to the existing courthouse annex, built in 1993 by Butler, Rosenbury and Partners.

“It was initially part of the plan when the annex was built,” Lloyd said. “It was designed to go up two floors.”

The plans include a larger office for the Boone County prosecuting attorney, a large jury courtroom and a jury assembly room. The $10 million to $12 million estimate also includes plans to renovate the Guaranty Land Title Building, 607 E. Ash St., or the Johnson Building, 601 E. Walnut St, said Jennifer Wilson, an architect with Butler, Rosenbury and Partners.

The commission has given the firm until December to submit the final plans and estimate. Elkin said the final price for the expansion will not be determined until the commission accepts a bid from a contractor.

Elkin said the commission plans to ask Boone County voters to pay for the expansion by approving a bond, which Boone County taxpayers would have to pay back with interest. He said the commission might put the bond issue on the ballot as soon as April 2006.

Now the Boone County Commission has to determine the best use of the planned addition. The commission met Nov. 18 to discuss moving the county’s juvenile office to the Guaranty Land Title Building.

“In my opinion, it would not meet space needs of the juvenile office,” she said.

If moved to the Guaranty Land Title Building, across the street from the courthouse, the juvenile office might be split between the first floor of the courthouse and the Guaranty building.

In addition, Lloyd said she was concerned that if the office is relocated, people entering the juvenile office would not have to go through security checkpoints that would be in place if the office stayed in the courthouse.

Judge Gene Hamilton, of the 13th Circuit Court, agreed with Lloyd, saying he would like to see the juvenile office remain in the courthouse because it would provide a security checkpoint for people entering the office. He also said the space in the Guaranty Land Title Building would not be adequate for the juvenile office.

“They will not have the square footage they need to operate,” Hamilton said.

But Hamilton and Lloyd do support expanding the courthouse.