Project Background
Operational and Facilities Master Planning in King County
As required by King County Code 4.04.200-C, Operational Master Plans (OMPs) must be completed before requesting any above-grade capital improvement project. Similarly, the Code also requires completing Facility Master Plans (FMPs) to identify the capital improvements necessary to deliver services outlined in the OMPs and in accordance with the County Space Plan.
FMPs are required to be long-range and must extend over at least a six-year period; typically the Facilities Management Division uses a ten-year planning horizon. The FMP is prepared jointly by the “user agency” (i.e., the agency to be using the capital improvement) and the “implementing agency”. For most County above-grade capital improvements the “implementing agency” (i.e., the agency actually building the facility) is the Facilities Management Division.
The development, consideration and approval of a FMP for any given agency typically follows the approval of the OMP for that agency because the mission and service requirements identified in the OMP are usually the key drivers of the facility needs.
King County Superior Court – Issues and Operational Summary
The King County Superior Court is the 12th largest jurisdiction in the United States. With 51 judges, 12 commissioners and 380 staff, the court handles many different types of legal matters. One of the court’s primary duties is the resolution of disputes involving children and families. The proceedings concerning children and families can be complex and demanding, with a high priority of keeping families whole while acting in the best interest of the children involved.
In addressing children and family legal matters, there can be numerous proceedings and hearings in which a family may need to participate in order to resolve a conflict. It is not uncommon for families to be involved in multiple case proceedings simultaneously, such as child dependency, dissolution, and juvenile offender or truancy actions. Each case type has multiple distinct statutes and procedures and a single family may find itself involved in proceedings for extended periods of time. In addition, the corresponding social and treatment services provided to the families, as mandated by the legal system, can often be difficult to access, particularly if they are remotely located, or have significant waiting lists, or require fees beyond the financial capability of the family.
Added to this case complexity and necessary corresponding service delivery methodologies, are issues with the court spaces used to resolve these cases. Space is often not available to provide the needed services that move the case forward. Parking is often not available or prohibitively expensive. Public transit is not structured in such a way to provide viable options to the locations in the county. Most functions related to Juvenile and Family court matters and related services are presently located at the following sites:
Downtown Seattle in the King County Courthouse (KCCH);
Downtown Seattle at the Youth Services Center site (YSC); and,
Downtown Kent at the Regional Justice Center (RJC).
In addition, there are offices in the Jefferson Building (CASA and Becca) near the YSC, satellite offices for probation staff, and the PAO Family Support Division in Kent.
Essentially the same case types are handled at the King County Courthouse and the Kent Regional Justice Center, but offender cases are heard exclusively at the YSC facility, along with dependency cases and Becca cases. No divorce cases are heard at the YSC site and facilities. The distribution of case types can be seen on the following table.
|
Case Type |
KCCH |
RJC |
YSC |
|
Domestic Relations (divorces) |
yes |
yes |
no |
|
Adoptions/Paternities |
yes |
yes |
no |
|
Juvenile Dependency |
yes (partial) |
yes |
yes |
|
Truancy, At Risk |
no |
yes |
yes |
|
Juvenile Offender |
no* |
no |
yes |
|
Civil – Domestic Violence Protection |
yes |
yes |
no |
*Although infrequent, offender matters can be handled at KCCH.
Currently, Family Law cases are heard either at the downtown courthouse or the Regional Justice Center (RJC) in Kent. Dependency fact-finding hearings are presently held at all three Superior Court locations: the juvenile court, the downtown courthouse and the RJC. Juvenile offender cases are heard at the juvenile facility; and truancy, at risk youth, and children in need of services cases (also known as Becca cases) are heard at both the RJC and at the juvenile facility. While multiple locations provide better local access to services, this approach does not necessarily lead to operational efficiencies or economies of scale in managing capital facilities. For example, the juvenile facility, which includes a detention facility, was not built in such a way as to be conducive to assisting youth and their families in resolving disputes. The current facility also faces millions of dollars in major maintenance projects in the near future.
Against the backdrop of this complex approach to resolving legal conflicts involving our community’s children and families, the court began internal discussions in early 2004 to identify ways in which the needs of children and family involved in the legal system could be more efficiently and effectively addressed. This dialog resulted in passage, in late 2004, of an ordinance allowing the court, its criminal justice partners and the community service providers to proceed with a targeted Operational Master Plan (OMP), aimed specifically at addressing the fragmentation of services and facility limitations currently existing in providing for children-family justice.
King County Superior Court – Operational Master Plan
In the spring of 2005, the Superior Court and the Office of
Management and Budget convened a work group to prepare an OMP work
plan. The OMP work plan was transmitted to the King County
Council in June 2005 and approved by motion in August 2005. The
purpose of the Operational Master Plan was to:
Identify the guiding principles for an effective children and family justice system;
Describe current programs, services and staffing for children and families in the court system;
Assess work flow processes, interfaces among programs and agencies, and needs for functional adjacencies; and
Make recommendations for improvements in the systems.
The Operational Master Plan was completed and adopted by the Council on September 25, 2006. Contained within the OMP are eleven recommendations which outline a strategy for more effectively resolving problems of children and families that are referred to court. Some of these recommendations involve changes to operations or internal court administration/governance; others imply additional capital expansion or improvement. In particular, it is anticipated that recommendations 5, 6, 7, 8 and 11 will require significant facility improvements. The 11 recommendations are as follows:
|
Recommendations |
|
|
1. |
Coordinate Court and Service Responses to Families Involved in Multiple Court Cases |
|
2. |
Improve Litigant Information and Assistance |
|
3. |
Reduce Case Processing Delays |
|
4. |
Optimize Therapeutic Courts |
|
5. |
Provide Case-Related Services On-Site |
|
6. |
Establish within the Court Facility Screening, Assessment, and Linkages to Community-Based Social and Treatment Services |
|
7. |
Provide a Safe and Secure Environment for Litigants, Public, Court and Court-related Staff |
|
8. |
Improve Facility Accessibility |
|
9. |
Assure Cultural Competency |
|
10. |
Optimize Technology |
|
11. |
Provide Facilities that Meet the Needs Identified Above |
Provide Facilities that Meet the Needs Identified Above
With respect to Recommendation 11 above, the Operational Master Plan states the following:
Recommendation 11: Provide Facilities that Meet the Needs Identified. This OMP outlines new potential directions that include providing a full array of services on-site, enhanced case management approaches, improved information and assistance to litigants, and other recommendations that in total may require additional space and a different facility or facilities. Since many of the OMP recommendations require that significant facility needs be addressed, the next step is to examine facility implications by completing a Facility Master Plan (FMP). In particular, the FMP should include an examination of three facility options based on the preferred packages selected by the Cabinet Oversight Group.
-
Facility Options
A
One full service facility
B
One initial full service facility, with a second full service facility to follow
C
Two full service facilities