EVERETT — It’s taken nearly two decades, but city leaders committed last week to fixing a municipal court so cramped the judges’ desks are in a trailer outside.
In a contentious decision, the City Council decided Wednesday to expand the court at its current location on Wetmore Avenue.
They also gave city staff another option to consider: build next door, tear down the existing site and add a parking lot. It’s a project that’s been called a “30- to 50-year decision” and probably the most important choice the council will make this year.
Just what the future municipal court is going to look like and which of those options might work better isn’t clear. No one has yet penciled out whether a new courthouse could even be built for the $6 million budget.
City staff plan to begin advertising for architects in a few weeks and hope to have a finished building in one to two years, said city spokeswoman Kate Reardon on Thursday.
Once an architect is chosen, that person will work with the city on both options, she said.
The city’s efforts to fix the municipal court have been ongoing for more than 15 years.
In 2008, the city thought it had found a solution. The City Council agreed to move the court to the police headquarters next door. The city spent around $100,000 for pre-design work but then dropped the project after staff realized it was going to be too expensive at $9 million.
The city’s most recent drawings for an expansion and remodel at the current site show a one-story, 16,000-square-foot building that isn’t big enough to meet projected needs, based on a 2008 study on the municipal court. That survey estimates the municipal court will need about 18,000 square feet by 2015 and 25,000 square feet by 2025.
The preliminary drawing also doesn’t conform to Everett’s own goals for downtown development, which encourages dense, multiple-story buildings.
The work that’s already been done will serve as a reference, Reardon said. It’s not clear how much taxpayer money the city spent on those preliminary designs because the work was done in-house, she said.
The decision Wednesday was not an easy one.
All the City Council members agreed something needed to be done about the court. Three weren’t convinced the city administration had asked all the right questions.
For instance, city staff said the long-term costs of operating the building were important but nobody had crunched those numbers, Councilwoman Brenda Stonecipher said. The city also didn’t look at how population might affect the court needs and didn’t consider options such as locating a court in south Everett, where the city is growing fastest.
“I didn’t have enough information,” she said. “The information I think we needed had not been created.”
That meeting was the first time the full council and the public got a look at hard numbers on what various options for a municipal court might cost and the city staff’s arguments for keeping the court on Wetmore.
Everett’s chief financial officer, Debra Bryant, said the municipal court needs to stay where it is because it’s part of a core of other government offices, including the police department, the Snohomish County Jail and City Hall. The city already owns the property and the site offers room for future expansion. The city also wouldn’t have to worry about moving to another property in a different part of the city where there might be a negative impact on adjacent businesses.
Over the years, all the work the city has completed on what to do with the municipal court always ends up pointing back to this place as the best site, Bryant said.
The current location will ultimately be more efficient for city workers and will probably save the city money in operational costs, she said. While cost is important, the decision came primarily down to location, she said.
Council President Paul Roberts, who voted for keeping the court at its current site, said it’s impossible to know exactly what every option might cost because some factors can’t be predicted.
“We’ve been trying to get some resolution on this issue for a long time,” he said. “I wasn’t convinced more time would give us better information.”
Council members Shannon Affholter, Drew Nielsen and Stonecipher voted no. Councilmen Ron Gipson, Arlan Hatloe, Jeff Moore and Roberts said yes.
Debra Smith: 425-339-3197, dsmith@heraldnet.com.
See the study
A 2008 study of the court’s needs and the city’s presentation on the municipal court are available on the online version of this story at www.heraldnet.com. The city has archived video of the Wednesday debate at http://tinyurl.com/mcpresentation. Click on “Watch Archived Meeting.”
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
