The Brown County Prosecutor’s Office may be getting a new home. The Brown County Commissioners and Brown County Schools Board of Trustees are in negotiations about the sale of the Career Resource Center.
The commissioners bid $445,000 for the CRC building at 246 E. Main St. The school board had established a minimum price of $500,000 after getting two appraisals. Commissioner Diana Biddle explained at the May 20 school board meeting that the commissioners had another appraisal done and their bid was based on that.
At a special meeting last week, the school board voted to let the county’s bid lapse. President Carol Bowden was to set up a meeting with county to discuss and negotiate the potential transfer of the building via an agreement. That meeting will be Monday, June 7.
Prior to the vote, the board discussed three options available to them since the lone bid came in under the minimum price: Walk away from the bid process and keep the CRC building to use for another function in the school district; enter into the agreement via both boards passing resolutions; or disengage from the current bid process and establish a new one.
Board member Amy Oliver said she was “uncomfortable” the county’s bid was below the minimum price, but said that transferring the property to the county via an agreement would save the cost of going through the bid process again since new appraisals would most likely be needed. “I do hate to pass up an interested buyer,” she said.
Board members Stephanie Kritzer and Steve Miller Jr. questioned where the money was going to come from for county to buy the CRC.
Last week in an interview, Biddle said the county would be pursuing a bond to pay for the building along with other planned capital improvement projects, like updating the building at 200 Hawthorne Drive for the Brown County Health Department to move there. The county bought the Hawthorne Drive building, which used to house the Nashville police, in June 2020.
So far, county government is operating out of nine different properties.
If the school board decided not to sell the CRC, one possible use mentioned at the May 27 meeting was moving the Brown County Health and Wellness Center there. It currently operates out of a former storage building at Eagle Park.
Selling the CRC building was part of the cost-cutting strategies the school board approved in February due to declining enrollment. BCIS was closed at the end of the school year and will be remade into the Educational Service Center. It will also house CRC programs and a daycare/preschool program with the goal of being the spot to educate people of all ages.
The plan was sell the CRC and then use the money to help in renovating BCIS to “better serve adult learners,” according to a presentation on the district’s 10-year plan.
The commissioners submitted the only bid for the building. The offer included a $50,000 down payment within 24 business hours of the offer being accepted. That would be subtracted from the purchase price at closing.
The commissioners approved Biddle as the negotiator and signatory of the transaction.
She said the plan was to use the CRC building as the new prosecutor’s office. It is currently in a former Army barracks and shares a parking lot with the Brown County Courthouse. “The current location is not adequate. This would allow us to have a little bit more space for the staff to breathe and breathe a little bit better,” Biddle said.
“Ultimately, we would like to tear down that building (prosecutor’s office) and add another drive access to the parking lot, add some additional parking there and that would separate the old log jail (next door) and make it more user friendly,” she said.
Building concerns
Prosecutor Ted Adams has two main concerns about his office space and his staff: Safety and space, in that order.
His office recently received a credible death threat, making safety an even bigger concern.
“Our sophisticated security measures are we draw the blinds so that they don’t know where we are in the building at least. That, and we lock up critical evidence in the gun safe right there,” Adams said.
The prosecutor’s office has sensitive material related to open cases that has to be protected, including evidence that has to be transported between trials.
There are other security issues in the building that cannot be discussed.
The building is similar to a modular house sitting on blocks, Biddle said. It was moved to the county in the 1960s and housed the health department and planning zoning before the prosecutor’s office moved in in the early 1990s, when the County Office Building was built.
The office had air and mold tests done that did not reveal any issues, but “the health complaints from the staff down there just points to there being some kind of an allergen that is making it less than nice to work there,” Biddle said. At least two employees have had respiratory health concerns stemming from working in the office.
The prosecutor’s office also lacks space. The hallway doubles as a place used to store files and law books. Adams’ office is the largest space in the building, so depositions are done in there.
The storage room has a fridge which always has a standing mold below it. “We’re not sure what it is,” he said.
The lunch and conference room houses files from important cases that will never be shredded. Some files have been moved to the basement of the law enforcement center, but others remain, like three plastic tubs from the Daniel Messel murder trial that are currently in Adams’ office. “I don’t have anywhere to put them. They’ve hung out in my office for five years now,” he said.
Adams and Chief Deputy Prosecutor Rob Seet have windows in their offices near the log jail. “I don’t know how many times they are looking in here at me,” Adams said about visitors.
The office has had computer failures due to electrical problems, too.
But Adams, who also pays Brown County property taxes, said despite these issues, he is not “clamoring” for a new office space.
“I don’t want my taxes to go up. If an opportunity exists to improve because of our concerns, absolutely, that is wonderful,” he said.
If the office moves, the current building will not be torn down immediately because that will also cost money, Biddle said. The staircase to the second floor of the log jail also is attached to the building, so that would have to be remedied.
What about the money?
Money to purchase the CRC building would initially come from a combination of cumulative capital development and economic development income tax money, Biddle said last week.
Later this month, the commissioners plan to approach the county council about taking out a bond since the last capital improvement loan they took out in 2018 is set to be paid off within the next month.
“It’s time for the next one, which is what we used to help supplement capital improvements, capital purchases. We’ve also have used it for additional local road improvements and things that aren’t covered by grants and that sort of thing,” Biddle said.
Last year, when COVID-19 hit and CARES Act relief funding didn’t exist yet, Biddle asked the county attorney to draft the next tax anticipation government bond, “just to have it in the event we needed to pull the trigger early,” she said. That paperwork is done with the exception of minor updates, like changing dates.
“I would expect to take action in their July (county council) meeting, which, the timing would be about right,” she said.
Because of the interest rates being offered, the paperwork will allow the bond to be up to $3 million, she said.
“It may be $2 million or $2.5 million depending on the rate. Their feeling is, the way things are going, we’re not going to see this rate again,” Biddle said. That rate that’s been proposed is less than 2 percent interest, but could go less than 1, she added.
Money from the bond would then be used to pay back the county’s cumulative capital development and economic development funds for the money that would initially go toward the CRC purchase.
[sc:pullout-title pullout-title=”Other office moves” ][sc:pullout-text-begin]
- The Brown County Parks and Recreation Department moved into the lower level of Veterans Hall after the fall 2020 election. Both buildings are at Deer Run Park.
- The BETA teen center took over the old parks and rec office at Deer Run starting June 1.
- The Brown County Community Corrections Office, which used to be in the lower level of Veterans Hall at Deer Run, moved to the new county building at 200 Hawthorne Drive last year. But it is now set to move again within the next month or so, to the second floor of the County Office Building where the health department currently is.
- The Brown County Health Department will move to 200 Hawthorne Drive sometime this summer. This will include the COVID-19 testing clinic and vaccination program, which will move out of the Brown County Music Center at the end of June.
