Commissioners seek courts floor plan for DHHS building
HILLSDALE COUNTY — The Hillsdale County Board of Commissioners has approved funding to solicit a floor plan for the courts if they were to proceed with moving a few or all of the courts into the county-owned building currently leased to the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services.
On Tuesday, July 25, Commissioner Doug Ingles, the county’s facility committee chairman, moved to approve up to $10,000 to have the National Center for State Courts draw up a floor plan that could then be used to solicit bids to turn the building into a courthouse.
The funding approved is coming out of money received from the sale of the Courthouse Annex Building, which the county is now leasing through 2028.
Commissioner Brent Leininger, the county’s budget chair, raised issues with the plan, calling it a “waste of money.”
“I don’t think it’s a viable option for us to consider moving our courts out to that building especially when that building is currently leased for the length of time that it is,” Leininger said. “I think we’re spending $10,000 chasing down a rabbit hole when it’s not going to lead to anything.”
Commissioner Steve Lanius said that when floor plans are done and bids are received, those figures could then be compared to figures provided earlier in the process that would see an addition built onto the historic county courthouse in downtown Hillsdale.
More: Commissioners eye DHHS building for future courts site
Commissioner Mark Wiley, who sided with Leininger and voted against the idea to solicit floor plans for the DHHS building in early July, said he was not “crazy about spending the $10,000” but voted with Lanius, Ingles and Commissioner Brad Benzing to approve the funding July 25.
Leininger added that obtaining a floor plan really did not matter as the county is restrained by its own budget and that there would not be funding to complete the project in the next three years without the voters passing a bond proposal.
The recent sale of the Courthouse Annex Building has left the “clock running down” for the commissioners to figure out a plan of where they will eventually move the 2B District Court given that they have to vacate the property by 2029.
While renovations at the historic Hillsdale County Courthouse are underway, the building cannot house another courtroom without an addition.
The commissioners sold the current Courthouse Annex Building to PAGO USA, a developer, earlier this year and signed a 5 1/2-year lease to figure out how to proceed with the court's space needs moving forward.
The NCSC was previously brought in to determine a space needs study and give the commissioners options that included multiple options for additions to the historic courthouse, moving two courts to Care Drive or renovating the existing Courthouse Annex Building.
The previous board of commissioners put a loose plan in play when they purchased the former Hillsdale Daily News building in 2018 and renovated it before relocating all non-court related county offices there from the Courthouse Annex’s second floor and the historic courthouse.
Their plan originally called for removing a load bearing wall in the historic courthouse to form a third courtroom but an architectural study commissioned by the new board of commissioners found that to not be feasible, which then led to the NCSC study.
Since then, while renovations have continued to the exterior of the historic courthouse, plans have been left in limbo.
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The commissioners agreed to proceed with selling the Courthouse Annex Building without having a solid plan in place for the 2B District Court, calling the sale the “first step” in the process.
Renovations to the historic courthouse have already exceeded $10 million with much of that funding coming from the county’s $8.8 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds and recent discoveries in failing masonry could cost the county an additional $1 million and a delay of the exterior work by one year.
While the board of commissioners is proceeding with floor plans for the DHHS building, a decision on an exact path forward has yet to be made.
— Contact Reporter Corey Murray at cmurray@hillsdale.net or follow him on Twitter: @cmurrayHDN.
This article originally appeared on Hillsdale Daily News: Commissioners seek courts floor plan for DHHS building
