Miscellaneous

Legacy or Ediface Complex? Kentucky's Courthouse Projects Go Pa-Ching!

By Anne Skove, Esq.

It's Sunday! You should be reading the new installment of PostSecret instead of court-o-rama but hey, your choice.

Kentucky's Chief Justice Lambert, who retired last summer, earmarked money (lots of it) to build new courthouses.

Just how much? Here are a few numbers:

• $14.9 million in Boone County (the county where everything closes if a single snowflake falls)


• $18.4 million in Bullitt County (that's the real name)


• $6 million in Cumberland County


• $6.6 million in Knott County (as in we're Knott kidding!)


• $7.9 million in Magoffin County


• $6 million in Mason County

Is this OK in Kentucky, where budgets for other services and programs lag, and where (in 2004) the median household income was $37,046, and 16.3% of the population lived under the poverty level?

The cost is due, in part, to Lambert's "all-new" (as opposed to renovation) policy. Also, these are not mere "courthouses," they are "justice centers." That means, we think, that correctional facilities, law enforcement, and other governmental entities could be housed therein, along with the courts themselves.

Accessibility and security add to the costs. Nobody gave a thought to features such as ramps or metal detectors a few decades ago, not to mention a few centuries ago when some of Kentucky's courts were built. (The oldest, according to the AOC, was built in 1818.)

Building a better courthouse can save money in the long run. New buildings can accommodate technological advances in ways older ones cannot. Better storage, clearer workspaces, and centralization of various governmental functions help increase court efficiency.

In retired Chief Justice Lambert's favor, if he hadn't spent the money on this project, people would be complaining about the shoddy conditions of the state's courthouses. Yes, they would. In a perfect world the money saved by not building a new courthouse would go to feed a hungry family, but we suspect the budget was not designed that way.

But people are complaining not only about the cost, but also about the procedure used. According to one report, the building contracts were not up for competitive bid. In 2000, new legislation providing a procedure for selecting court building projects was passed. Local project development boards handled the nuts and bolts of a project, with the AOC holding veto power over major decisions. Some have commented that the local boards possess too little power.

See the first article of a trilogy: A Poor State Rich in Courthouses, Linda B. Blackford, Herald-Leader (September 7, 2008). See also 250 Lowest Per Capita Personal Incomes of the 3111 Counties in the United States, 2006, Bureau of Economic Analysis (May 7, 2008).

Full post as published by court-o-rama.org on September 07, 2008 (boomark / email).