Lame ducks on Kane Co. Board factoring into decisions
The Kane County Board will have at least nine new members plus a new chairman after the November election. And the lame duck status of that large a segment of the board has begun to factor into the big decisions facing the current board, especially when those big decisions involve big dollars.
But at least one decision appears ready to inch forward despite the board being in flux.
The county board’s finance committee voted Wednesday to move forward with $426,000 of architectural work and cost forecasting for a relatively small expansion of the judicial center. Chief Judge Robert Spence has pushed for an expansion for several months now, citing the need for more courtrooms to keep the judicial system moving at a pace that doesn’t flood the jail with costly inmates awaiting trial.
The problem with spending that money is the possibility that the new county board that comes into office in December may not want to spend the $10 million to $15 million the expansion will cost. With that in mind, some committee members said Wednesday they feared doing the architectural work now could amount to flushing good money down the toilet.
“Looking at the $10 million or $15 million that this may project into, I don’t see that in the cards here,” board member Phil Lewis said.
That concern is an echo of a decision made last week by a committee working on a technology upgrade for the court system that may cost up to $12.6 million. The committee decided to hold off on spending $90,000 on a consultant to help with that upgrade until a new county board, county chairman and circuit court clerk take their seats. The rationale being that those new officials may not reach the same conclusions about that pricey technology upgrade as the current committee exploring the issue.
Although $426,000 is much more than $90,000, finance committee members agreed to spend it despite what the future may hold. County staffers and former Chief Judge F. Keith Brown convinced the committee there’s no way spending the $426,000 now is a waste of money.
Tim Harbaugh, the county’s executive director of facilities, said the judicial center is the county’s No. 1 space problem.
“It’s not if you build an addition to the judicial center; it’s when,” Harbaugh said. “This is information that won’t age.”
For Brown, the when is as soon as possible.
“The more you delay this, what I see is us building a building in peak construction time,” Brown said. “It will cost more. And the longer we wait, the problem becomes worse.”
The full county board still must agree to the expense before the project moves forward. If approved, Wight & Co. will perform the work. The company is a campaign contributor to several Kane County political organizations, board members and the county board chairman.