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Attorney answers questions about courthouse
The lawyer representing the Greene County Building Corporation and the Greene County Commissioners said the upcoming civil lawsuit filed against the so-called "design team" for the courthouse project offers no guarantees for a favorable legal outcome, but there is a strong case to be made that damages have been done and somebody besides the county is responsible.
The discussion came Wednesday morning at the monthly meeting of the Greene County Building Corporation when Bloomfield resident Jim Breeden asked what happens if the county is unsuccessful in the civil lawsuit that was recently filed against the engineering and architectural firms that designed the courthouse project.
Attorney Marilyn Hartman said as a lawyer she never likes to say to a client that winning a lawsuit is a sure thing, but in this case she is optimistic of a favorable judicial result.
"If you are a lawyer and you're dealing with judges and juries there is no 100 percent guarantee. In this case, however, I think one thing is pretty clear from the facts. The damage to that building is not the fault of Greene County. We didn't design it. We didn't build it. We hired professionals who were charged with the responsibility to give us a good design. We hired professionals and charged them with the responsibility to give us a good building. So in looking at us as the plaintiff, we are suing the people that we are suing. I think it would be minuscule to say that we're not going to recover something," Hartman said, "The question is how does the responsibility wash out. There are going be claims for damages that are very specific structural damage claims ... for example we had to pay $130,000 to pay for the structural grout that was done a year and a half ago. That's a dollar amount that is actually in the ground. That's a damage. There are other damages that may related to the cost of a material increase. There will be and there have been claims filed by (general contractor) Weddle (Brothers Construction) that related to subcontractors. There will probably be an open issue as to whose responsibility that is."
Hartman said it's unlikely that the county will be in a position that it doesn't collect something from the suit.
"But then again, I would crazy as a lawyer if I didn't say, 'anything is possible,' but given the facts we have. Here we have a county who contracted with professional people to do work and something went wrong. There are going to be experts that look at what happened with that design, and they'll basically say 'it's this person's fault or that person's fault, or part here and part there'. Then, that is what will be sorted out in the litigation," Hartman added.
Hartman said preparation is key in a civil suit like the one that was filed and she recommended to the commissioners and the Building Corporation that a recognized expert firm in construction litigation like the Indianapolis firm of Drewry Simmons Voorehm be hired.
"So much of the litigation costs have to do with litigation. But when you are prosecuting a lawsuit the biggest and greatest quality you must have is preparation," she said. "If you don't have preparation and it's not good, we're wasting our money on that firm. They came highly recommended. It (these kinds of suits) are very, very complicated."
Hartman said there are types of litigation that she does not handle so when someone comes in and has a question and it's outside the scope of her practice, her job is to make a referral.
"My job then as a lawyer is to refer that person to some sort of specialist of a firm that specializes in that area," Hartman explained. "That's pretty much is what has happened here."
Building Corporation member David West, of Linton, explained that early in the project ---- when problems first arose ---- the board, commissioners and Hartman recognized that the project would likely end up in litigation. That is why an outside law firm was hired.
"Marilyn along with everyone else made preparations. Letters were written there was meeting after meeting after meeting before the decision was made to hire this firm from Indianapolis. As far as I'm concerned they are the best firm to handle construction litigation in this part of the country," West said. "I have really been impressed with them. I think they are going to do us a good job and I think we're going to win. Hopefully, that money that we've paid them will be reimbursed from the folks that we've filed the lawsuit against."
Hartman said it's likely that a special judge will be appointed in the civil lawsuit filed in Greene Circuit Court on Dec. 30, 2004.
The suit seeks more than $3.1 million in damages caused by the delay in the courthouse renovation/addition project.
The seven-count, 24-page lawsuit named United Consulting Engineers, Inc., Indianapolis; DLZ Indiana, LLC, Indianapolis; and Alt & Witzig Engineering, Inc. Carmel as defendants.
Is there money left to furnish the building?
Breeden, who was accompanied to the meeting by another Bloomfield man Bob Long, asked if any money would remain to furnish the $10.5 million building when it is completed some time next year.
Breeden said he's "been told" there is no money set aside for furnishings. He wondered if that was true.
Hartman, who said that was not true, explained the project contains an estimated line item of $350,000 for furniture and fixtures. But she said that amount of money is probably not available since the project has been delayed and incurred extra expenses relating to repairing the foundation and addressing other safety concerns after structural problems erupted in January 2003.
"Basically, what we have is a pot of money and right now, especially given the structural damage that we've experienced, the amount of money that we have available to do everything isn't adequate to get everything done. So it is something that the county council is going to have to address," Hartman said.
Corey said the two-story addition plans call for a large amount of "built-in" fixtures ---- especially in the two courtroom areas in the new structure, which are part of the original base contract. Corey said he wasn't sure about money for desks, chairs and other fixtures or furnishings would be available.
Hartman added, "There is a project estimate for everything. That total of the estimate was $11,600,000. That is what figures we had as estimates. That was before Weddle or any of these other contractors gave us bids. That was just with people putting figures together to help the (county) council make up their minds about how much they actually wanted this bond issue to be. After looking at those figures, the council approved $10,500,000 as the bond issue. So we have some estimates and the estimates are greater than what we approved. Keep in mind they were estimates. The project was bid with 13 alternates. Not all of the alternates were accepted so there are some things we can wait to do. I think the council's thinking about this was 'you don't know until you get down the road how things are going to come out in the wash'."
She continued, "Yes, it would be really nice to have brand new furniture and everything. I think in terms of looking in terms of where your priorities are, that probably isn't going to be on the high side."
Is the building still moving?
Breeden also asked if "there was any movement in the building at this time."
Project manager Corey quickly said there was none.
He explained that Bledsoe and Tapp Inc., of Bloomington, have been monitoring for movement since January 2003.
"There have been no recorded movement since the original move back in 2003 that I'm aware of," Corey stated. "I got here (hired) in November 2003, but there hasn't been any since I've been here."
Corey explained that monthly foundation movement monitoring reports have been forwarded to the project engineers and architects and he added, "There hasn't been a report yet where any of the structural people or the engineering people have shown any concern at all."
Was the right site selected?
Breeden told the Building Corporation members that in his opinion the biggest mistake that's been made on the project so far is the decision to build onto the current courthouse structure.
"I think the commissioners back at that time made a great error by suggesting building onto this building (the old courthouse). They knew that building was in bad shape. They were told several years ago by another engineering firm to leave the building alone. They also tested the soil and they was told that the soil wasn't good enough for this kind of an addition. They forgot about that, hired another engineering company and went ahead with it," Breeden said.
Board member West replied by saying, "I don't think anybody would argue that point."
However, Hartman said the decisions weren't made by the commissioners without extensive study and research and discussion with members of the public as well as engineering experts in the construction field.
She said the issue of trying to find more space for the courthouse dates back to 1991. Three studies were conducted and at least 10 different building sites were examined. Public informational meetings were held to provide information and to seek input from the public. At the meetings, site selection choices were discussed.
Hartman replied, "Decisions were made and people after the fact with 20-20 hindsight can look at something and say 'Gee, that was a bad decision'... In hindsight, you might look at it and say that was a bad decision. But I think if you look at the history of this project you will see that there was rather considerable care taken to look at alternatives and to look at costs and to look at timing before anything was actually done. Then ultimately, you do have a board of commissioners, it is their responsibility to make these decisions and they made a decision to go ahead with this particular project," Hartman explained. "You know, those are your elected officials. We've had an election and apparently maybe people thought that (the current site) was a bad decision. The people have spoken. We now have a slightly different makeup of the board (of commissioners)."