Fair officials oppose $30M judicial center move

COEUR d’ALENE — As it turns out, relocating Kootenai County’s justice facilities to the North Idaho fairgrounds is not as cost prohibitive as previously thought.

The problem is the fair board doesn’t want them there.

County commissioners heard an update from staff Monday on the recurring proposal to uproot all court-related buildings from the administrative campus near downtown and move them to the fairgrounds.

The move’s price tag, including the extensive remodeling that would be required to transform courtrooms into office space, is about $30 million. That’s about the same as if the county stayed put at its present location off Government Way near Northwest Boulevard.

Previous cost estimates for the fairgrounds move were millions of dollars higher. Officials, however, said those figures were just speculation. The county since has learned that city permits and sewer cap fees are based on square footage and valuation no matter how far the project is from the city’s hub.

Wherever they build, the county envisions a four-story building of 90,000 to 120,000 square feet.

Commissioners don’t want to drag their feet once they pick a location.

“What I’d like to us do — whether it’s here or whether it’s there — is to break ground by next summer,” Commission Chairman Chris Fillios said.

After staff cautioned his timeline was optimistic, he revised it to fall 2020.

The fairgrounds option is endorsed by Commissioner Leslie Duncan.

Jerry Johnson, president of the North Idaho Fair Board, said moving justice facilities to its turf was not a good idea.

“The fairgrounds are irreplaceable, and they keep chunking away land a little bit at a time,” Johnson said Tuesday.

First it was relocation of the sheriff’s office and jail, and then the county moving the fair’s extension office.

“[The county] has just slowly acquired more and more property from the fairgrounds,” Johnson said.

Officials estimate if the justice facilities moved to the fairgrounds, it would need a 4-acre footprint — about an acre for the building and the rest for 364 parking spaces and right-of-way.

Extra parking would not be required if the justice facilities remain at the current campus

Under an agreement with the city of Coeur d’Alene last year, 205 parking spots were designated for county employees and “county campus visitors” across Northwest Boulevard in front of the courthouse campus.

Advocates of the fairgrounds plan say it would allow the county to plan 30 to 40 years into the future, eliminate inmate transport costs and alleviate the pressure on the busy downtown core caused by the influx of traffic and people.

Fillios said the justice facilities needs are especially pressing in light of major growth anticipated in the court system over the next two years.

The state in 2021 is planning on adding two judges plus support staff to District 1, which includes Kootenai County. And a recent $1.5 million grant from state’s Public Defender Commission will fund at least eight new attorneys and five support staff for the county.