Officials exploring possibility of new Las Vegas courthouse

Las Vegas city officials are exploring the possibility of a new downtown courthouse, which would give the city’s municipal court a building of its own.

The city is soliciting proposals for a roughly 100,000-square-foot courthouse at a maximum cost of $55 million to house its six judges and more than 200 staff members. The municipal court currently shares space at the downtown Regional Justice Center, also home to Las Vegas Justice Court.

Because of expected growth in both the city and county court systems, city leaders are considering building a separate courthouse, through a partnership with the developer that would initially see the city lease the building. The $185 million justice center was plagued with delays and cost overruns before it opened in October 2005 — more than three years late and $15 million over budget.

Similar to the way city officials funded the City Hall building on Main Street, the request for proposal outlines a setup where a developer would acquire property and build a courthouse for lease-back to the city for up to 25 years, with an option to purchase after three years.

“That gets us a lower cost,” spokesman Jace Radke said. “It’s an opportunity for us to get into the building and when it becomes advantageous for the city, we put the (municipal) bonds out there at that point.”

The city wants proposals that would limit annual expenses to no more than $2.7 million in rent, real estate taxes, maintenance and building insurance. The city is asking for plans that would keep the annual courthouse operations and maintenance costs under $1.4 million.

Mayor Carolyn Goodman fleetingly mentioned the request for proposals for a new courthouse during her annual State of the City address last week, but the idea is so new that multiple council members this week said they hadn’t seen details.

The lease-purchase structure that financed the City Hall building, which opened in 2012 at 495 S. Main St., proved controversial. The city prevailed in a fight to keep that project off the ballot.

The city occupies 75,000-square-feet at the Regional Justice Center, according to the documents.

The goal is for the county to buy the city out of its equity at the Regional Justice Center, which needs to be negotiated with the county, Radke said. That money and other court revenues, would pay for the new courthouse, Radke said.

“For us to proceed, it needs to be cost-neutral, without additional cost to the taxpayers,” Radke said. “If that piece doesn’t work out, we’re not going to do it.”

County courts may grow to the point where they need the space the municipal courts currently occupy, but the county hasn’t been actively planning for that, said Clark County Commission Chairman Steve Sisolak.

There were “very preliminary” talks several years ago about what would happen if the city left the Regional Justice Center, but specific dollar figures weren’t discussed before the talks were dropped and Sisolak hasn’t heard anything about it since.

The city wants a facility that could hold 220 full-time employees and associated work spaces, six identical courtrooms and one larger courtroom that could hold 60 people at any given time.

The six municipal judges handle a collective annual load of 120,000 cases.

The defined geographical project area is in the city’s downtown core, bounded by Bridger Avenue, Garces Avenue, Sixth Street and the Union Pacific Railroad tracks, located west of Main Street.

The specifications call for a building that’s designed and built to meet Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certification standards for resource efficiency and is “compatible” with the surrounding neighborhood. The Las Vegas City Hall building is LEED-certified.

Developers have until Feb. 12 to submit courthouse proposals to the city.

The municipal court has jurisdiction over traffic violations, criminal misdemeanor offenses, city code infractions and civil ordinance actions that occur within city boundaries.

Contact Jamie Munks at jmunks@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0340. Find @JamieMunksRJ on Twitter.