Hillsdale County’s 2B District Court must move within three years. Catherine Maxwell | Collegian
The decision leaves the 2B District Court three years to find another location
The future home of Hillsdale County’s 2B District Court is uncertain after the county’s board of commissioners voted to keep another tenant in an office building it had previously considered using to house the court.
The county currently leases the office building at 25 Care Drive to mental health program LifeWays. The commissioners voted 3-2 last week to extend the lease until 2030, which prevents the commissioners from moving the district court into that building. The court’s lease in another building owned by Hillsdale Renaissance, a real estate development and property management firm, is set to expire in 2028.
The new lease extends two years past the court’s 2028 deadline, but it does include a termination clause that allows the county or LifeWays to opt out with 180 days’ written notice.
Where the court will be housed next is unknown, and District Judge Megan Stiverson said she was ready to sue to prevent the court from being “shoved” into an insufficient space.
Stiverson appeared before the board at a July 22 meeting to remind them of their legal obligation to provide a suitable place for the court.
“You do, pursuant to the County Board of Commissioners Act of 1851, have an obligation to provide for the courts,” Stiverson said at the meeting. “If you vote to extend that lease, unless you are planning on violating their lease in the future, you are leaving the district court without a place to house a functioning branch of the government.”
The district court is currently located in the Courthouse Annex at 29 N. Howell St. Hillsdale Renaissance bought the Courthouse Annex in April 2023 and rents the building back to Hillsdale County.
District 4 Commissioner Brad Benzing said ballooning repair costs prompted the commissioners to approve the sale.
“Our facilities director said the least expensive option to fix the things that were wrong with the annex building was a million bucks,” Benzing said. “We couldn’t afford that, so we sold the building to Hillsdale Renaissance, with the understanding that we would have the use of the building over the next five years.”
Luke Robson, owner of Hillsdale Renaissance, said Hillsdale County stipulated favorable lease terms as part of the sale.
“The county crafted a lease that allowed them to rent the building from me for $0 a month for three years, then $600 a month for another two and a half years before finally leaving in October of 2028,” he said. “Understanding that this was the price of doing business, I took the deal.”
The board of commissioners originally planned to move the court into the top floor of a county-owned office building at 25 Care Drive once the lease with Hillsdale Renaissance expired in 2028.
Benzing said it would be prohibitively expensive for the court to renew the lease for the annex building with Hillsdale Renaissance.
The board authorized $120,000 in architectural drawings for a proposed renovation of 25 Care Drive to accommodate the court.
Before voting in favor, District 5 Commissioner Brent Leininger said it would be too expensive to renovate 25 Care Drive to accommodate the district court. He said the court should trim its staff and fit into the historic Hillsdale County Courthouse, which already houses the First Judicial Circuit Court and the Family and Probate Court.
“The court must fit into the space that we have available,” Leininger said. “Our responsibility at the board of commissioners is to provide the space. We have a [courthouse]. It’s not fully utilized. We have adequate space and adequate funding to convert that space to what we need. We don’t have the funding for a $4 million renovation on 25 Care Drive.”
Benzing said the commissioners had previously hired an architect to gauge the possibility of moving the district court into the historic courthouse, but the prospects of either renovating or expanding the courthouse were both too expensive.
“One proposal was estimated to be in the neighborhood of $15 million,” Benzing said. “The second larger proposal, which would address all of the issues, was probably closer to $30 million. Just totally financially impossible for us to tackle.”
Benzing said fitting all three courts in the courthouse with no renovations or expansions was just not possible.
“I’m not an architect, so I don’t feel qualified to say myself, but we have been told by an architect that it is just impossible to get all three courts in there.”
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