City Leaders Break Ground on New Municipal Courthouse Building
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Montgomery is getting a new municipal court building. It should be up and open for business in about a year. City leaders met this morning for a groundbreaking ceremony in downtown Montgomery, where the courthouse will be built.
City leaders say a new courthouse is desperately needed. The current one, which is attached to the Montgomery Police Department was built in the 1950’s, has just one court room, and is not very efficient.
A new municipal court building is officially under construction.
“We are now in a position to break ground because it’s now time to get this started,” said Montgomery Mayor Todd Strange.
The courthouse will sit on Madison Avenue in downtown Montgomery. Strange says it’s a prime location.
“It did in fact fit into the overall scheme of Madison Avenue with the curb market and Cramton Bowl and the multiplex and what we’ve got going on with Patterson Field.”
The city set aside five million dollars for a new courthouse back in 2010 but kept getting quoted higher than that for the project. It was just recently that a quote came back within budget. The city is using local contractors, as part of the newly launched small and minority business initiative.
“We work with several major companies in this town, reaching out to buying into the idea, realizing that it’s a great venture to participate in it and I think we’ll have great success with it,” said Doug Moore, a consultant with the initiative.
Presiding Municipal Judge Les Hayes said the new space will make the court system more efficient.
“We have one courtroom where we are and now, we’ll have two functioning courtrooms and the ability to complete a third one if necessary.”
He says the staff has outgrown the current courthouse on North Ripley Street
“As the population has grown, obviously our needs to service the population has increased.”
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The city purchased the property from the Department of Revenue for just one dollar two and half years ago. The new courthouse will be complete and open for business in about a year.
The Montgomery Police Department will repurpose the courthouse and turn it into additional office space, once the new courthouse is built.
