Elkhart County officials discuss final steps for financing the consolidated courthouse

 

ELKHART COUNTY, Ind -- The finance committee for the new Elkhart County courthouse met to review and make decisions on their second bond, as they look to begin the construction for the two-year project.

The design of the new Elkhart County courthouse is going to sit on 32 acres of land on reliance road in Goshen and officials are ironing out the final details, for the payment of that facility.

"This is the second set of bonds that are required to pay for the construction of the courthouse," said Elkhart County Administrator Jeff Taylor.

The county approved the first bond in 2021 called the general obligation bond.

The discussion of the second bond Wednesday night, the lease revenue bond closes out the final cost of the 94 million dollar courthouse.

"The lease rental bond will be sold in January," said Elkhart County Attorney Craig Buche.

"This second set is approximately 60 million dollars to help pay for the construction," said Taylor.

Those dollars were collected through taxpayers without increasing their taxes.

As for the construction of the courthouse, it’s a two-year project and the county wants to begin this spring, in order to meet the 2024 opening date.

"This project and the process started about a year and a half ago with the design build process where the county issued a request for qualifications from contractors that were interested. The county selected I believe 8 or 10 and asked them to provide actual proposals and then they evaluated those proposals and selected performance services about a year ago and then from that point they worked on the design and the construction contract to get us to the point we are today," said Buche.