Courthouse Not Worth Court Case

Only three months ago it appeared that South County would get a new, large courthouse, a mere 20 years after the proposal was first floated.

Well, not so fast. Somewhere along the line the cost for the proposed building was cut from $54 million to $20 million. One reason probably was that the square footage also was slashed, from 250,000 to 87,000.

Even the smaller courthouse might sound spacious, but not for an eventual 19 courtrooms plus offices for staff of the Probation Department, district attorney and public defender. After the county reduced the size of the proposed building, Municipal Court Judge Pamela Iles got her dander up. Iles long has campaigned for a new South County courthouse to replace the woefully overcrowded and outdated facility in Laguna Niguel.

Iles threatened a lawsuit if the supervisors did not live up to their promise of the larger building. The supervisors said they would increase the proposed budget to around $30 million if there were no lawsuit. The deadline for a compromise between the judges and the county is days away.

Both sides need to avoid a court fight over the proposal. The supervisors set the deadline; they can and should extend it. They also should look again at the compelling reasons for a full-sized courthouse in South County.

Orange County’s population continues to grow, with many of the new residents heading for South County. That’s where the open land is; that’s where the new communities will sprout up, including one called Ladera, in the vicinity of Mission Viejo and Rancho Santa Margarita, where the new court is slated to be built.

It makes no sense for the county to build a courthouse that will be overcrowded in a few years. At the Laguna Niguel building, clerks work in stairwells and a conference room has been used for hearings because the facility is too small. It was meant to serve 100,000 residents when it was built 30 years ago. Now it serves nearly 600,000.

The county is right to keep a close eye on expenses. But Iles and her colleagues say they know how to finance a new building that would be big enough to handle the need. They deserve their day in court.