by Bradley Parsons and
Kent Jennings Brockwell
Staff Writers
Reaction to the mayor’s county courthouse plan received a generally favorable reaction from Jacksonville’s legal community with most giving credit for staying within the City’s limited budget. But, some questioned the wisdom of splitting up the county’s civil and criminal courts.
Mayor John Peyton announced Wednesday his plan, which calls for the construction of a new criminal courts building on the seven-square-block LaVilla stretch that was originally envisioned as the site for a collective county court complex. That plan was deemed too expensive, so Peyton opted to keep the civil courts at their current location on Bay Street and house the State Attorney’s Office and Public Defender’s Office in the old federal courthouse and Ed Ball Building, respectively.
By splitting up the county’s court functions, Peyton aims to keep the project’s budget within the $190 million set forth by the voter-approved Better Jacksonville Plan. Putting everything under one roof would have cost about $280 million on top of $60 million already spent on design and land purchases. The City’s original budget for the project was $190 million. The project is scheduled be complete by 2010.
The plan was one of four options presented to Peyton by an advisory group composed of Duval County Chief Judge Don Moran, State Attorney Harry Shorstein, Clerk of Court Jim Fuller and attorney Jim Rinaman Jr., the group’s chair. The plan picked by Peyton was the group’s lowest-ranked option, but Shorstein said he liked the mayor’s solution, given the City’s budget constraints.
“It’s not the lowest-ranked plan on my list, I’ll tell you that,” said Shorstein. “I would favor building everything together right now if it was economically feasible. But, realistically, the public expects, and should demand, that the mayor be fiscally responsible, and with this plan Mayor Peyton has done that.”
The plan still provides an avenue for the County to consolidate its court complex later, said Shorstein. He said property values would continue to climb at the current courthouse’s riverfront location. As the market appreciates, Shorstein said the City could sell the building for significantly more money and use those funds to consolidate.
“It will be up to a future mayor to make that decision. But, my understanding is the criminal courthouse will be built to facilitate the addition of the civil side. It’s probable that, when that decision is made, the property will be valuable enough to dispose of it and move on toward a unified courthouse,” he said.
Shorstein said he had some reservations about moving into the old federal courthouse. Ideally the SAO would be housed with the criminal court, he said. But, Shorstein thinks the 160,000 square feet inside the federal courthouse should be sufficient.
“I’d like to drive a Mercedes, but public officials shouldn’t be driving around in Mercedeses,” he said.
Public Defender Bill White is looking forward to having some extra space in the Ed Ball Building. His office is slated for 80,000 square feet inside the building, which sits across Hemming Plaza from City Hall. Currently, White’s office is working out of a 55,000-square-foot location, and White said space is getting tighter by the day.
“We are running out,” he said. “My administrative director, Bob Hair, is constantly asking where we are going to put our new attorneys.”
The Ed Ball Building was built about a year after the current courthouse and White said it contains “a lot of the features that are in the old courthouse that make it unacceptable.” But he likes the idea of being closer to the new courthouse.
White said the mayor’s plan isn’t set in stone. If changes are made and the City expects the Public Defenders to stay put in its Market Street building, White said the building would have to be expanded. White said he’s had to “cannibalize” his current office’s DUI video reviewing rooms to make space for new hires.
“There are some spaces here and there that we could rearrange,” he said. “We could make it work, but if the mayor left us in the current building they would have to build additional floors to make it through 2020.”
While the glass looks half-full to the SAO and Public Defender’s office, that perspective isn’t shared by Ed Booth, a partner at Spohrer, Wilner, Maxwell and Matthews. The firm built its West Adams Street office based on the City’s original plan to build a unified courthouse complex in LaVilla. The current plans fall far short of that promise, said Booth.
“They promised us this gleaming complex that hits you in the stomach when you see it from I-95. That’s what we thought we were getting when we went into the voting booth and voluntarily voted tax increases on ourselves. And that’s what the firm expected,” said Booth. “This plan is an absolute slap in the face and an insult to those of us that supported the original concept.”
Building only the criminal court in the heart of LaVilla could “condemn” a neighborhood that the City was trying to revitalize, said Booth. He also questioned the safety of moving criminal defendants through downtown from the cross-town jail.
“You know who hangs out at a criminal courthouse? Criminals. Somehow I don’t think that’s going to do much for property values or new development in the area,” he said.
Booth gave the mayor credit, though, for using the old federal courthouse, a historic building that he said deserved preservation.
Spohrer, Wilner’s LaVilla neighbor, Patrick Coleman, partner at Coffman, Coleman, Andrews and Grogan, also invested in the area based on the City’s plans to build a LaVilla courthouse. In addition to moving its offices there, the firm has bought additional property in the area for office development.
Coleman said he thought the mayor’s plan was the best solution possible, given the budget constraints.
“Like everybody else, I had fallen in love with the idea of a nice, domed complex. But I think the mayor is doing the responsible thing doing it in pieces,” he said. “Eventually, we would love to see the civil side right outside our office, but any development in this area is a positive.”