2008 Annual Report - Superior Court of California - County of Los ...

Facilities
Without fanfare, the Los Angeles
Superior Court in mid-2007 took
its first step toward transferring
ownership of all of its courthouses from Los Angeles County to the state of California.
This process marks our reaching the final phase of the process of unifying the superior and
former municipal courts.
For the Long Beach Courthouse, which has, unfortunately, become something of a symbol
for the statewide need for new and upgraded courthouses, this moment cannot come too soon.
For us, the need is all the more urgent since fully three quarters of our buildings do not meet
current seismic safety standards. In addition, most of them are outmoded, cramped and
difficult working environments for the judges and employees assigned to them — not to
mention the customers who use them.
It is likely that sometime in the first half of 2008, the ownership of the Long Beach
Courthouse will pass legally to the state. An urgent, $16 million project to relieve some of the
courthouse’s most pronounced earthquake vulnerabilities will be completed in
that same period.
Because the need in Long Beach is so great, an earthquake safety upgrade
was authorized and paid for by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors,
even though building ownership is about to fall out of county hands.
Long Beach is hampered not just by seismic risk, but by leaky ceilings,
inadequate parking, inoperable escalators and the overall design of the
building, which requires, among other things, that defendants in custody be
escorted through the same hallways that are often jammed with witnesses,
jurors, spectators and other court customers.
Replacing the Long Beach Courthouse will be a time-consuming,
extraordinarily expensive process. There is no time schedule for even the first
phase. There is also the cost — more than $340 million at today’s prices. The
amount is certain to increase before construction can begin. The earliest
completion date for a new courthouse is 2013, although even preliminary
design work has not yet begun and financing remains uncertain.
Cost considerations also have prompted a historic step for courthouses in California. For the
first time, consideration is being given to developing a new courthouse through a publicprivate
partnership. If this process is negotiated successfully, a commercial developer could
make the initial investment in construction of the new courthouse, leasing the facility back to
the Court.
The county’s decision to shore up the Long Beach Courthouse was the first of two in which
the Board of Supervisors approved use of county money for improvements on a courthouse the
county will no longer own. In mid-2007, the board agreed to invest about $2 million to
increase the capacity of the Michael D. Antonovich Antelope Valley Courthouse in Lancaster
by adding two courtrooms.
30 Delivering Justice to a Changing Community