Attend 3-10-15 City Council meeting to Save Placerville Courthouse

It is imperative that the Judicial Court system remain the tenant of the Courthouse building. If the Court moves out of the building, the County of El Dorado will be left to find a new tenant or owner of the building. There are two issues of concern if the State abandons the Main Street Courthouse. One is economic hardship and future blight to downtown Placerville. The second is our local governments have a poor track record of stewardship over historical resources, allowing buildings to deteriorate to a point where they need to be demolished.

If the Courthouse building is no longer used as a courthouse, then the fate of the building could be left up to the Placerville City Council, the very people that wanted to tear down the world-famous Hangman Building. Or, the County of El Dorado could determine the building’s future. The Bayley House was donated to the County in 1977 and was allowed to deteriorate and be vandalized until turned over to a contractor, who removed the exterior woodwork and left a giant hole in the back of the building. The Blue Ribbon Committee cannot guarantee that the Courthouse building will not meet a similar fate.

 

Please attend and speak up during Open Forum at the March 10, 2015 Placerville City Council meeting at 6:00pm.

For detailed information, see message below which was sent to the Placerville merchants.

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Dear Downtown Merchant,

WE NEED YOUR HELP TO SAVE OUR COURTHOUSE!!!

The Placerville City Council meeting is Tuesday night, March 10, starting at 6 pm in the Town Hall, 549 Main Street.   Agenda item 7 is described as PUBLIC COMMENT – BRIEF – NON-AGENDA ITEMS and it should come up between 15 to 20 minutes after the 6pm meeting start time.  Mayor Borelli will read the brief description about what this is, an opportunity for members of the public to speak for up to three minutes about matters not on the agenda as is the case for the issues we all wish to raise.

It would be very effective to have as many merchants and downtown employees as possible attend AND speak at this council meeting.  We need to raise our collective voice and be empowered by each other.  If we cannot stand up for our best interests as a community then we get what we get.  PLEASE make the time to attend and be heard.

I have contacted News 10 and they are taking the story to the reporters this morning and will get back to me about covering this story.

What we want to do:

• Demand (the time for asking is past) that the city write a letter to the Judicial Council stating that moving the courthouse and its functions off of Main Street will cause economic hardship as well as create blight due to the fact that the building is not suited to any other function.
• The City can ask the State to choose Alternative 2 which is an option for a smaller courthouse to be built by the jail and retains the function of the Historic Main Street Courthouse. This option makes more sense and would save the City, County and State millions of dollars in infrastructure and capital improvement costs.  Alternative 2 is an environmentally superior alternative, would still accomplish most of the design principals and objectives desired by the State while maintaining the economic and social benefits of the City of Placerville.  Therefore, the State must not certify the EIR to accept the project as proposed and instead should either extend the comment period or choose Alternative 2: Reduced Size.
• The City can ask that the public comment period be extended in order for the affected public, that was not clearly notified, has the opportunity to comment on this project. Jurisdiction does carry weight.
• The time to write this letter is NOW as it must be received before the final EIR is certified.
• The fact that we could get so far down this process without the community being aware is unacceptable. Look at the large NOTICE TO SELL ALCOHOL APPLICATIONS that are required of businesses—-impossible to miss!  Where were such notices about the courthouse?