The Richland County Commissioners along with county department heads met Wednesday morning to review preliminary plans for the upcoming courthouse’s remodeling project.

Chad Sutter, Stevenson Design in Miles City, shared the plans with officials which include replacing windows, taking out walls, rearranging offices and updating the mechanics. “The plan is to do that in phases,” Sutter said. “Hopefully not everybody is getting disrupted at one time, but there will be areas that will probably need to be temporarily relocated.”

The plan seems to be addressing the third level first, which currently houses district court and clerk of courts. But since those offices will be transferred to the new Justice Center, the floor will be vacant. Then contractors will work on the ground floor and finally the main floor. The goal is to keep disruptions to a minimum. Starting with the ground floor, some of the preliminary plans include transforming the current office of the driver’s exam and restrooms into a lower vault for the clerk and recorder’s office with stairs that lead up to the second floor. Restrooms would be relocated. Plans also include storage and plan rooms, various offices that would connect as well as the mechanical/IT room that could possibly be connected to the second floor. The Department of Revenue would most likely stay where it is.

On the main floor, Sutter said the treasurer’s office would expand into the current superintendent of schools office and would have two vaults and a private entry for officials. Officials discussed the types of doors they’d like to have for the public to use when entering the office as well as installing a type of security window.

The clerk and recorder’s office would also stay the same with a vault on the southeast side of the building and stair case connecting to the lower vault. Doors would be installed at the front office to provide more security. The clerk’s office located in the northeast corner would be reduced in size.

As for the commissioners’ office, Sutter said the plans are to make it larger with the inside wall pushed back 6-7 feet. “You guys have a pretty tight desk right now,” he said. The extra space will allow the commissioners to move easily from their desks and allow more space for visitors. Chairs for the public have been drawn to be in front of the window, but after some discussion, it was decided the seats should face the commissioners.

On the third floor, plans are still being discussed as to what should be done with the district court room. As it currently stands, plans are to transform it into a large meeting room where 15-20 people could “easily” sit around a conference table. Commissioner Mark Rehbein said he agreed a meeting room is needed, but officials will still look at options.

The clerk of courts rooms would be transformed into two extended vaults. The two departments that could also be relocated to this floor include the driver’s exam and the superintendent of schools.

The question of whether to digitize records in order to downsize on space for files also arose. Though it was agreed there are problems staying with paper (fire risks) and going digital (updating software), officials said they preferred going digital as long as the software is secured. Commissioner Don Steppler said they’ve been in contact with the records preservation in Helena in order to have someone go through files in all the departments and identify which files can be destroyed and ones that can’t as well as ones that can be digitized. The idea is to keep unneeded files from moving during the remodeling project.

Some of the other topics covered included what to do with lighting in the foyers (Sutter suggested using authentic lights from the time period the courthouse was built), what to do with break rooms (especially the clerk and recorder’s office) so employees don’t eat in front of customers, bringing ceilings down in the offices, installing shelving units in certain offices, what to do with the original decorative paintings on the ceilings of the foyer and repairing the skylight on the third floor.

reporter@sidneyherald.com