Benton County officials back courts study

BENTONVILLE -- Benton County's justices of the peace agreed Tuesday to continue the courts building study, with a series of committee meetings to provide input into the process.

The justices of the peace discussed the study during the Quorum Court's Committee of the Whole meeting after several raised concerns at last week's Finance Committee meeting their concerns wouldn't be heard or included in the study. The Quorum Court approved spending $178,000 on the next phase of the study but several justices of the peace raised the possibility of rescinding money the study if they weren't satisfied with their role in the process.

Joel Jones, justice of the peace for District 7, reviewed a letter from County Judge Bob Clinard setting out his plan for the study. Clinard has set up a work group of representatives of the circuit judges, prosecuting attorney, public defender, circuit clerk and county clerk, sheriff's office and Jones to represent the Quorum Court.

"I think that he is taking it that we would not be working directly with the architects," Jones said. "I will still call Public Safety meetings and expect the architects to be there when they need to be there. I'm fairly confident we can express our opinions when we meet and have them listened to by the architects."

Tom Allen, justice of the peace for District 4, said he's concerned having a single justice of the peace represent the Quorum Court could minimize the impact of the justices of the peace, many of whom have expressed different concerns about the project.

"We all have our own strengths and weaknesses," Allen said.

Allen also suggested Barry Moehring, justice of the peace for District 15, should have a seat on the work group. Moehring is the Republican party nominee for county judge and will face Libertarian party candidate Ronnie L. Smith and write-in candidate Jeff Broadston in November.

"It would be wise in my opinion to have him on that committee because, again in my opinion, come Jan. 1 he's going to be county judge," Allen said.

Moehring said he was "definitely not lobbying" to be on the work group. He said he has serious concerns about the results of phase I of the study and concerns about what may come from phase II. He said the Quorum Court needs to provide input but also to be prepared to deal with the results of the study.

"At the end of the day, the 15 of us here are the last firewall," he said. "There are some conclusions in phase I that I frankly do not agree with. We have to be sure we have a lot of input on the front end or we might not like what comes to us on the back end."

Circuit Judge Doug Schrantz asked the justices of the peace to let the work group proceed. He said much of the work they'll do involves the small details of courtroom design and functions only people who are familiar with courts will understand. Schrantz said he has been through a court needs assessment with the district court building in Rogers.

"That was on a smaller scale but similar," he said. "It involves a bunch of stuff that only the folks who use the place are going to understand. It's not going to be how much is it going to cost? Where is it going to be? All those major policy decisions are still going to come back to you. You need to let them go through this process"

Jones said he's working on a new date for the Public Safety Committee to meet and discuss the project. He said an Aug. 15 meeting has been cancelled and the panel will instead meet Aug. 30 or Sept. 1. He said Clinard has assured him the work group will delay the first of three planned public workshops until after the committee has met. Jones asked the other justices of the peace to note any issues they want to include in the discussion and send those to the County Clerk's Office so they can be included on the agenda.

"We will have the discussion among ourselves," Jones said. "Then we can move forward to discussion with the architects."

NW News on 08/10/2016