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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowMarion County courts will begin to transition more than 200 employees to Indianapolis’ new Community Justice Campus next month after delays to the move-in process, the Marion Superior Court announced.
Emily VanOsdol, court administrator for the Marion Superior Courts, confirmed Thursday that the courts’ formal move to the new facility will begin April 19.
Light operations will commence through April 28, with jury trials continuing to take place at the City-County Building.
The court office will then make its official transition to the new facility April 29. A soft opening with light operations will start the week of May 2, with juries still at the City-County Building.
Full operations will begin May 9 at the Community Justice Campus, bringing jury trials to the new facility.
Marion Superior Presiding Judge Amy Jones hosted a media tour of the new facility last week, accompanied by VanOsdol and Marion Superior Judge Marc Rothenberg.
The courts had planned to move at the end of 2021 or early 2022, with the main courthouse later rescheduled to move the first week of February 2022 and conclude by the end of that month. But COVID-related delays changed those plans in December 2021.
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When I find an attorney or court employee who doesn’t complain about the move, it will be the first one. The entire Indianapolis legal community is built around the City-County Building and the federal courthouse. Now everyone is expected to relocate their offices to a near eastside residential area that is depressed economically and probably isn’t very safe. Or they can take their car out of a downtown parking garage and drive the 1/2 hour round trip to the facility (not counting the time to get the car out of the garage.) The location was poorly thought out to say the least. Then to compound that the City has no plans for what to do with the CCB. With the pandemic and telecommuting, there is no demand for commercial space. And converting the CCB into a residential or mixed use building will be extremely expensive. Of course, city officials will have taxpayers assume those costs for some politically-connected developer (it’s the Indianapolis way after all.) In the meantime, the area around the CCB will continue to suffer.
All good points, Paul. I suspect that if the legal community were to relocate to close proximity to the new CJC, the immediate longtime residents would remonstrate against many of the necessary land use processes that would arise – uses I suspect are incompatible with adopted city plans – putting the City in an odd predicament of conflicting policies.
For all of the reasons you mentioned, this is a very short-sighted plan. They may as well put out RFPs for the City Market as a whole. If the city couldn’t make the market successful with the CCB fully occupied, they have next to zero chance of success with one half full.
You know Paul, I’m surprised the geniuses that run our city haven’t come up with a plan to convert the CCB into the world’s largest homeless shelter. Think how convenient it would be for the vagrants, mentally ill and drug addicted to have a short commute to the downtown streets every day where they could panhandle, intimidate pedestrians, defecate on public sideways and in parks, and generally make great nuisances of themselves and add to this new homeless vibe in Indy.
Oh, and you’re absolutely spot-on with your comment about the politically connected developer.