News

Commissioners divided on costly courthouse project

Although architects and contractors trimmed the cost of the Judicial Complex Addition and Renovation project, or JCAR, by $45 million, commissioners can’t agree on the way forward. Commissioner Michael Edney favors option 3, which ‘shells in’ a fifth floor of the courtroom tower for future use, at a total cost of $167 million. [FENTRESS ARCHITECTS/HASKELL COOPER]

By Bill Moss, Published: May 14, 2024

Although Henderson County commissioners could reach a compromise on a costly courthouse addition, they’re not there yet.

Two motions for moving forward on the work — one in favor of a $158 million option, the other at cost of $167 million — failed in 3-2 votes last week.

Emphasizing that the combined detention center-courthouse expansion would cost 2½ times more than the current capital project record-holder — the $60 million Hendersonville High School new construction-renovation — Commissioner Bill Lapsley led the charge for the lower cost option.

Commissioner Michael Edney, touting his experience working in the courthouse against Lapsley’s 50-year career as a civil engineer, called the lower cost option penny-wise and pound foolish.

Meanwhile, neither David Hill or Daniel Andreotta, who will be leaving the board in December after losing their re-election bids last month, seem keen on making a majestic new courthouse a part of their lasting legacy.

Commissioners could bridge the $9 million difference and salvage the project as early as Wednesday, when the topic is on the agenda for their budget workshop.

Four stories or five?

The pair of failed votes on May 6 came after architects, project managers and the county staff presented new options for lowering the cost of the Judicial Complex Addition and Renovation (JCAR), which originally came in at a jarring $215 million.

Board chair Rebecca McCall had appointed Lapsley and Edney as the County Commission’s liaisons “to work with staff and our architectural team and our contractors to go and find options to bring savings to the taxpayer and as much as possible meet the needs of the program that we studied for all of the users of these buildings and weigh those options,” Christopher Todd, the county’s point man on the project, reminded commissioners.

The deepest cost cut was option 2, which trimmed the courthouse tower from five to four stories, and substantially scaled back renovation of the existing Grove Street Courthouse, which was built in 1995.

“If you reduce that floor you do lose two courtrooms in the original programming,” Todd said. “We were able to maintain those court spaces with a light touch in the ‘95 (courthouse), which accomplished this board’s goal of doing less work and finding a substantial cost savings.”

That was the option Lapsley chose in his motion to go forward.

“This project, even at this reduced scope, (totals) $158 million,” he said. “The largest project capital project this county has undertaken was Hendersonville High School and that was $60 million. We’re talking about a project more than double — close to 2.7 times — what was the largest project in our county’s history. I don’t take that lightly at all.

“With all due respect to our friends in the court system and detention center — I understand these things are needed — but it’s our job, the five of us, to decide how to spend the taxpayers’ money,” he said. “And I think we have an obligation to do it as low as we can to accomplish the goals and the needs. I’m not prepared to spend another $8.6 million to shell out level five. I don’t think it’s justified for this board to do it.”

‘Pennywise and pound foolish’

Edney insisted that the five-story courtroom tower is the right option.

“I’ve been here a long time, we’ve built a lot of stuff,” he said. “As I’ve said before, we’ve built to a budget and not met the long-term needs of the county and the citizens. We can point to I-26 and other things we put off — it doubles, triples the cost.

“There are two parts of each equation. One is the engineers’ side of it and one is the users’ side of it,” he continued. “I’ve spent 40 years using this (historic) courthouse (on Main Street), the ‘95 courthouse, Buncombe County, Haywood County, many across the state, so I know operationally what is pennywise and pound foolish.”

He conceded that the four-story option creating seven courtrooms could work.

“But it’s short sighted because we know from the professionals we need at least nine,” he said. “The only way to get where the professionals say we need to be is to do what Gaston County did and that is shell in the top floor. It’s a little bit of money now to save a whole lot of money later.”

Hill is ‘a no on any of these options’

Hill opposed all options on the table.

“With everything that’s going on with the economy right now, I can’t in good conscience lay $155-170 million on the taxpayer,” he said. “I think there’s other options out there that we need to explore besides this. I’m gonna be a no on any of these options.”

Andreotta worried that the cost could jeopardize needs elsewhere.

“Someone tell me what happens in 2026 or 2027?” he said. “If Glenn Marlow and Rugby Middle School, for example, both need to be greatly expanded because of space or a school needs to be built, can the county do that and keep on this or would there be a tax increase?”

McCall thanked the staff, architects and contractor for surpassing her goal of trimming $30 million from the $215 million price tag.

“The thing that has always bothered me in this county is anytime a project was undertaken that I can recall it always seems to be undersized and we’d reach a point where it was out of space,” she said. “The schools are a perfect example of that.”

“I would almost go with the option to shell it out because of the concern about eventually running out of space and not being able to add it later,” she added. “You can’t go in and add a floor later if you have to have it. And while I’ve always thought that the design of five floors was overkill because I don’t like the look of it — it overshadows the existing building — I’m thinking more from a space perspective.”

Motions to move forward failed in two 3-2 votes.

McCall joined Lapsley in his motion to move forwards with option 2. Edney, Hill and Andreotta voted no. Then McCall joined Edney in voting for the five-story option 3. Lapsley, Hill and Andreotta voted no.