Winter rain responsible for construction delays at the new South
County Courthouse
Winter rain responsible for construction delays at the new South County Courthouse
n By Rose Meily staff writer
A rainy winter has delayed the new South County Courthouse currently under construction in Morgan Hill and added another $200,000 in costs to the already pricey project.
The building, scheduled for completion in August of next year, won’t be finished until December according to Ken Rato, manager of capital programs from Santa Clara County.
“Overall, progress on the new courthouse is pretty good,” Rato said. “But we’ve had a rainy winter this year and this has caused problems with the groundwater. That’s held up some foundation work in the basement of the courthouse.”
Rato attributed the $200,000 extra cost to $100,000 that had to be paid to the contractor for the treatment of the soil and overhead costs. Initial construction was projected to cost $31.8 million, approximately 20 percent more than County Supervisors had originally hoped. The total project cost will top $50 million.
Supervisor Don Gage said he wasn’t aware of the construction delays or increased costs to the already expensive courthouse. He said the county will likely use contingency dollars or reserves to cover the increased expense due to the construction delay, but it won’t affect programs the county has already decided to fund this year.
“We’re so far into this thing that we can’t turn around now,” Gage said. “We’ve wasted millions of dollars on this. At the planning stage, we’ve already invested $12 million. There’s no turning back now – we can’t leave the building unfinished.”
The courthouse is currently under construction on an eight-acre lot at the corner of Butterfield Boulevard and Diana Avenue, south of the Caltrain parking lot in Morgan Hill.
Once finished, the new courthouse will replace the San Martin site with two new buildings. A 73,000 sq. ft. building will hold six courtrooms, jury rooms and underground holding area for suspects. The other 17,000 sq. ft. building, called the Justice Agency, will house district attorneys, public defenders and the probation department.
Rato said workers will be pouring concrete for the walls of the courthouse basement next week and they are currently setting structural steel for the framing for the Justice Agency’s building.
Construction of the courthouse is a collaborative effort by Morgan Hill, Santa Clara County and the Superior Court.
“Obviously, I’m disappointed. We’d like to see the courthouse finished on schedule and within budget. It’s always a disappointment when that does not occur,” said Dennis Kennedy, mayor of Morgan Hill and chairman of the Redevelopment Agency. “The courthouse will provide a real benefit to our downtown in terms of bringing lawyers, jurors, judges and so on, into the community, so the sooner that it is opened up and operating, the better as far as I’m concerned.”
Morgan Hill’s Redevelopment Agency bought the land for $7 million to avoid a lawsuit by the county challenging the RDA’s authority. The creation of the RDA took property tax that would have gone to county coffers.
The county abandoned the San Martin courthouse complex at Monterey Road and Highland Avenue because mold was discovered in the building. Judges are currently using trailers on the site to conduct hearings. Judges at the South County courthouse could not be located for comment.
Rato said “(The delay will mean) the judges will just have to stay in the portables a while longer, but they are nice portables and the new building will be worth the wait.”
Rose Meily cover City Hall for the Morgan Hill Times. Reach her at 408-779-4106 ext. 201 or by e-mail at rm****@mo*************.com.
