Clark County Family Services plans for new $33-million home

The Clark County Department of Family Services is planning for a new home at the Clark County Government Center campus on South Grand Central Parkway.

The cost estimate for the new 100,000- to 150,000-square-foot multistory building starts at $33 million, according to planning documents and officials. The project includes a multistory parking garage with 450 to 600 parking spaces.

The project details and the cost could change because planning is in the early stages, said Alex Ortiz, a Family Services manager who has been overseeing the project.

Family Services has eight sites throughout the community and faces space challenges because of growth, Ortiz said. The department has about 800 full-time and part-time employees, spokeswoman Kristi Jourdan said.

“We thought it was best to centralize our operations as much as possible,” Ortiz said Thursday. “I think it will make us more efficient. I think there are a lot of benefits that we would get from being in one location.”

On Tuesday, Clark County commissioners will be asked to approve a contract with Carpenter Sellers Del Gatto Architects. The contract is not to exceed $440,568 and would provide services for pre-design, site analysis and conceptual design for the new facility, according to supporting documents.

The work should be completed, submitted and presented to Real Property Management, which helps manage the county’s real property assets, no later than 110 days after approval is granted.

A 2005 county needs assessment suggested that the new facility and parking garage be located toward the south end of the Government Center, according to Clark County spokesman Erik Pappa. The location, however, has not been finalized.

Administration, child protective services, permanency services, case management and support programs and foster and adoptive parent programs would be relocated to the new building. Child Haven, a temporary emergency shelter for abused and neglected children, will continue to operate at its current location, Ortiz said.

The new building would include conference rooms and training rooms and could accommodate the use of technology. But there’s still a lot of planning that’s needed for the project, Jourdan said.

It would roughly be “about a five-year process, starting kind of now until we move in,” Ortiz said.

The eight properties that Family Services now uses are a combination of county-owned facilities and leased buildings, Ortiz said.

One of the buildings the department leases on Martin Luther King Boulevard is for sale for $18 million, according to a listing from CBRE Group, which provides commercial real estate service. The 63,365-square-foot building is owned by Thompson National Properties, according to property records.

Family Services began a 10-year lease in January 2010. The lease is set to expire in January 2020, but there are five one-year options should the department decide to continue to rent, Ortiz said.

If that building is sold before the new building is completed, officials don’t expect changes except having a new landlord, he said.

Family Services pays about $1.5 million a year to lease the building on Martin Luther King Boulevard, according to Pappa. It costs about $2.3 million to lease four properties, including the one on Martin Luther King.

County officials are going to issue bonds to pay for the project, according to Pappa.

“Fortunately, the savings from no longer having to make lease payments will pay for the bonds,” he said Thursday.

Contact Yesenia Amaro at yamaro@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0440. Find her on Twitter: @YeseniaAmaro.