The Heart of Bexar County

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Above: Removal of the Gondeck
addition.
Below: A 15-foot metal fence designed
by sculptor George Schroeder, named
“Justitia”.
square foot windowless second story addition
to the west side of the Courthouse also designed
by Gondeck.
For the next 40 years much talk took
place about the inappropriate additions. But
nothing happened.
To remove the Gondeck additions, we would
have to develop a plan to relocate employees to
another building. For several years, Commissioner
Paul Elizondo advocated building a new
administrative office building on a parking lot
located across Main Street from the courthouse
and next to the Justice Center that had been built
in 1988. An underground tunnel had been
constructed under Main Street connecting the
Justice Center and the courthouse.
I teamed up with Commissioner Elizondo to
get the support to move forward with the
building. The new building would save $600,000
a year in rental payments that we were paying to
house county employees in other buildings. It
would also provide space for the relocated
employees working in the Gondeck additions.
We approved the construction of a new 10
story, 215,000 square foot building. It would be
the first major vertical construction that the county
had undertaken in 20 years. It would be wrapped
in Pecos red sandstone and granite used in the
original courthouse. It would also include the
latest technology and energy efficiency standards.
Solar panels would be installed, the first building
downtown to do so. We would be the first publicly
owned LEED Silver building in San Antonio.
The offices of the District Clerk, County Clerk,
Auditor, District Attorney, Budget and Economic
Development Departments and other administrative
offices would be housed in the building. The
Commissioners Court would take the top floor. The
District Attorney’s offices would be moved from the
Justice Center into the new building, allowing us to
fill that space with eight new criminal courts.
5 2 F T H E H E A R T O F B E X A R C O U N T Y