New Administration Building Project Put on "Hold"

Even After New Proposal With Reduced Cost Commissioners Decide To Wait Until Impact of Revenue Reductions Is Determined
By Sid Riley

In response to an earlier request from the County Commission, at Tuesday’s commission meeting Ajax Construction and Donofro and Associates made another presentation of a revised approach to the new county administration building construction project. This proposal took a minimum cost approach, with reduced square footage and only three stories. This approach allowed for little future growth, but would have allowed space for consolidation of all county functions for existing staffing. The final reduced cost was just under $11,000,000.

During the discussion following the presentation, the parking issue was again addressed. The existing space in front of the proposed building site is often filled from parking needs created by court functions. With the additional requirements that would be created by the proposed new building, parking problems would be compounded unless additional land can be purchased for supplemental parking.

If the county entered into this project, the payments on the low interest loan would be approximately $640,000 per year. It is planned that increased tipping fees realized from operations at the Spring Hill Land Fill would contribute to covering this cost, along with the $93,000 annual savings in existing lease costs for space now leased from private individuals.
Later, during the final phase of the commission meeting, Commissioner Pittman entered a motion to place the project for the construction of a new Jackson County Administration Building into an "on hold" status until January of 2009. Discussion of this motion revealed that many of the commissioners are worried that the reduced revenues from the property tax changes combined with reduced grant funding from State sources may create budget shortfalls next year. With this threat looming, they felt that it would be an inappropriate time to enter into a new obligation for the county of the magnitude of an $11,000,000 new facility.

The motion was seconded by Commissioner Crutchfield, and passed 3-2 with Commissioners Spires and Branch voting to continue the project. So the new administration building is now officially on hold until next year.

This approach means that when the project is again brought up for consideration, construction costs may be higher than at present, thus increasing costs. Additionally, this means an additional year of operations with county functions fragmented and scattered around the area.