By Stephen Nelson
Several years ago, the Will County Board voted to demolish the Old Will County Courthouse in Joliet but now the body is rethinking that strategy. At a special meeting on August 17, a resolution to consider alternatives to the original plan was debated.  The full text of the resolution follows:
WHEREAS, the former Will County Courthouse, located at 14 West Jefferson Street, Joliet, Illinois, has been vacated following  the move of the Twelfth Judicial Circuit Court into the new Will County Courthouse, located at 100 West Jefferson Street, Joliet, Illinois, in November 2020; and WHEREAS, the County Board previously approved Resolution No.19-107 on April 18, 2019 that recommended the demolition of the former Will County Courthouse upon completion of the new Will County Courthouse; and WHEREAS, the County Board’s approved Resolution No. 19-107 following testimony that adaptively reusing the former Will County Courthouse was “not in the best interests of the citizens of Will County, as such an endeavor would be difficult, costly and illogical, given the constraints imposed by inefficient floorplans, deteriorated building systems, and estimated cost of building renovations versus estimated cost of new construction”; and WHEREAS, the former Will County Courthouse has not yet been demolished, but asbestos abatement throughout the structure has been completed; and WHEREAS, in the four years since the County Board approved ResolutionNo. 19- 107, new information concerning the viability of adaptively reusing the former Will County Courthouse has come to the County Board’s attention; and WHEREAS, such new information includes an increase in the projected cost of demolition of the former Will County Courthouse; and WHEREAS, such new information includes new estimates of the per-square-foot costs of adaptively reusing the former Will County Courthouse compared to the costs of new construction, prepared by the county government and presented to the Capital Improvements Committee of the County Board on April 4, 2023, showing that new construction is significantly more expensive; and WHEREAS, such new information includes the listing of the former Will County Courthouse on the National Register of Historic Places in May 2023, enabling any income producing redevelopment project to utilize the Federal Historic Preservation Tax Credit at 20 percent of qualified expenditures; and WHEREAS, such new information includes that effective July 1, 2023, Joliet is now a River Edge Redevelopment Zone city, which would enable any redevelopment project to utilize the River Edge Historic Tax Credit Program at 25 percent of qualified expenditures, which is often layered with the Federal Historic Preservation Tax Credit for an overall credit value of 45 percent; and WHEREAS, such new information includes the fact that the County may be able to take advantage of such tax credits to partially fund either a County-managed redevelopment project or a developer-managed redevelopment project, making adaptive reuse of the former Will County Courthouse more financially attractive compared to demolition and replacement with new construction; and WHEREAS, although the State’s Attorney has opined that a developer-managed redevelopment project would not be permissible under the original “public use” dedications of the site, multiple state legislators have offered to work with the County Government and the County Board to seek any statutory changes which may be necessary to facilitate adaptive reuse of the former Will County Courthouse funded through private investment; and WHEREAS, such new information includes the fact that multiple private-sector real estate development and architecture firms have expressed interest in potential adaptive reuse projects, which would be wholly or partially privately funded; and WHEREAS, such new information includes the fact that on June 26, 2023, the Will County Executive publicly announced her intention to seek to create a consolidated local government campus on the site of the old courthouse, and on June 28, 2023, in presentations before the Joliet Historic Preservation Commission, multiple developers and architects opined that adaptively reusing the former Will County Courthouse is the most cost-effective option to create a local government campus on that site; and WHEREAS, such new information includes the fact that the County Board, a majority of the members of which have taken office since 2019, has not been presented with an opportunity to vote for or against demolition during its current term and, in light of the new information, numerous County Board members have publicly stated the desire to see the County review and exhaust all possible reuse options before proceeding with demolition and WHEREAS, notwithstanding Resolution No. 19-107, such new information, taken as a whole, suggests that adaptively reusing the former Will County Courthouse, rather than demolishing it, may be in the best interests of the citizens of Will County; NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that the Will County Board supports the concept of fully investigating the potential adaptive reuse of the former Will County Courthouse, prior to proceeding with any further action toward demolition; and BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Will County Board directs the County Executive to conduct a full and complete investigation into the potential costs and benefits of adaptively reusing the former Will County Courthouse, including both publicly-funded and privately funded options and both public uses and mixed uses; and BE IT FUTHER RESOLVED, that the Will County Board directs the County Executive, and all associated departments under the purview of the Executive, to take no further action toward demolition of the former Will County Courthouse until such time as the Board so directs, upon determining that adaptively reusing the former Will County Courthouse is not in the best interests of the citizens of Will County; and BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Preamble of this Resolution is hereby adopted as if fully set forth herein. This Resolution shall have full force and effect upon its passage and approval as provided by law.
The board voted in favor of the resolution, which will now be forwarded to the Executive Committee for its consideration at next month’s meeting.