Benton County is looking at the potential of spending more than $50 million for a new courts facility.
Ouch!
This in a county where a number of rural residents don’t want to pay an annual $85 levy to assure an ambulance will respond when one is needed. You’ve got to wonder if there is any chance they would support throwing up trailers for courtrooms, let alone building a $50 million building.
County officials can certainly make an argument we need a new courts facility. Historically and architecturally, the main part of the courthouse is cool, but when it was built, no one knew we would have more than one judge and hundreds of people — prisoners included — schlepping through the building and the annexes.
If you have never toured the courthouse and annexes, you should, and you should probably do it on a day when there are several court proceedings ongoing. It’s a zoo. People lined up to go through metal detectors, prisoners chained together, traipsing through the building.
Then there is the issue of parking.
To be fair, the courthouse and ancillary buildings have been updated throughout the years. The big courtroom used to be the coldest place in Bentonville no matter the season. I carried some kind of jacket or throw or quilt to court every day of a trial in a vain attempt to stay comfortable and keep my teeth from chattering. The reports I hear say it is still noisy — think First Friday in the middle of a murder trial — and I would bet it is no easier to heat and cool than it was all those years ago.
The smaller courtrooms are, to me, claustrophobic. It doesn’t take many people in the audience to make it feel cramped. And one small sneeze can mean no one heard what was said.
County Judge Bob Clinard said he believes cost estimates are too high and can be cut. Clinard was in construction before he got into politics so I should think he would have a handle on stuff like that. Still, how much could you truly save?
Court facilities surely do not cost as much as jails. Still, security is an issue, so metal detectors must be installed. I assume there are sally ports so prisoners can be brought straight into the building.
There would be all sorts of electronics to wire – everything from computers, telephones, security cameras, probably even television.
At least a half-dozen courtrooms, although if I were building it I’d add two or three more because we are only going to get more judges. They need chambers, and the juries need private rooms where they can cogitate on the cases before them.
That’s a lot of rooms.
And the building needs restrooms, lots of them. When I was covering a big trial, you had to wait for the jurors to hit the restroom before anyone else had a chance. The ladies room adjacent to the big courtroom was a two-holer. Can you imagine how long it took for a potty break?
Elevators, stairs, offices – it all adds up.
Before going much further, however, a decision as to where to put the courts building must be made. Basically, there are two options: downtown near the courthouse — there are two sites — or on Southwest 14th Street near the jail. I see pluses to both.
Bentonville city and downtown officials favor a downtown site. That may surprise some of you. Who wants a bunch of criminals marched through their pristine downtown? Bentonville business owners, that’s who.
And it is mostly because of money. Not money from the criminal element, but that spent by their lawyers, family members and county employees who support the courts. The fear is if the courts are moved, the income loss could be deadly for small business.
The site near the jail makes a lot of sense. The location couldn’t be better in terms of moving prisoners between facilities — far fewer chances of escape simply because the move would be a few hundred yards, not halfway across the town.
The county already owns the 14th Street property, as it does one of the sites downtown. I do believe, however, that future expansion might be more easily accommodated on 14th Street, and that has to be considered.
The Quorum Court will make the decision as to which plan to follow and where to build.
It should be an interesting 2014.
LEEANNA WALKER IS EDITOR OF THE ROGERS MORNING NEWS AND SPRINGDALE MORNING NEWS. FOLLOW HER ON TWITTER AT WWW.TWITTER.COM/NWALEEANNA.