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Fiscal Notes
October/November 2006 |
Historic restorations restore community pride
Courthouse Curb Appeal
On hot Texas afternoons in July 2004, several Wharton County community members gathered at the county courthouse with metal detectors to search for buried treasure--of sorts.
After a few days of prospecting, the men found what they were searching for--cresting from the roof of the courthouse. They believed it blew off the building during the hurricane that destroyed Galveston in 1900 and now had proof, said Jeffrey Blair, the president of the Wharton County Courthouse Restoration/Preservation Inc., a nonprofit organization committed to restoring and preserving the county courthouse.
The earliest photograph of the courthouse taken in 1903 did not show the cresting, an iron architectural feature, because the photograph was taken after the Galveston hurricane, Blair said.
With proof that the cresting was original to the courthouse, which was built in 1889, the restoration team gained approval from the Texas Historical Commission (THC) to add it to the roof of the courthouse under renovation, Blair said.
"We were even able to take the cresting and match it to ones sold in 1889," Blair said.
The THC awarded Wharton County a $4 million matching grant to restore and update the Wharton County courthouse, Blair said. The architectural renovations must be historically accurate, which is why the team set out to prove that the cresting actually existed.
Other updates include electrical wiring, modern restrooms and Americans with Disabilities Act improvements, such as wheelchair ramps.
Plan to preserve
Texas' historic courthouses, or those more than 50 years old, are eligible for THC matching grants, said Sharon Fleming, associate director of THC's Texas Historic Courthouse Preservation Program.
Since the program began in 2000, THC has awarded $145 million to counties that have provided THC with plans on how they will restore their county courthouses, Fleming said. THC has completed 26 restoration projects and another 24 projects are ongoing.
There are 235 historic county courthouses in the state, Fleming said.
"There is at least one courthouse in each of the 254 counties in Texas, but in many counties there are more than one and even more than one historic county courthouse," she said.
The state provides up to 85 percent of the restoration project funds, and the county provides 15 percent in local matching funds, Fleming said. The average restoration project costs about $4 million, she said.
To be eligible for the grant, counties must prepare a preservation master plan, which is a broad assessment of the building that lists the features of the courthouse that are important to preserve and provides an estimate of the proposed work and cost, Fleming said.
"We have 127 counties that have prepared this master plan and applied for funding," Fleming said.
In some cases, counties have issued certificates of obligation to pay for their portion of the restoration, while others have raised funds through private donations.
"Counties have used some creative fundraising efforts," Fleming said. "One woman contacted everyone who owned any property in the county, and some lived as far away as Switzerland. They raised $500,000 just through donations."
Other counties budget for the project over several years, Fleming said.
"The projects typically take two or three years to complete, and the whole process may take four or five years, so the counties can kind of plan for it," she said.
Golden age
The golden age of Texas county courthouses began in the 1880s when legislation passed allowing counties to issue certificates of obligation to build county courthouses, Fleming said.
"Counties could go quite heavily into debt doing this," Fleming said. "Counties sort of competed with each other to see who could create the largest and grandest courthouse, and that sent out a signal to potential residents that this community was going to go somewhere."
County courthouses were the center of county trade and commerce, so a bigger, grander courthouse was meant to encourage investment and growth in the community, Fleming said.
Due to inadequate funds for repairs and routine maintenance, many of these once-grand courthouses have become dilapidated and are a danger to those working in them, she said.
"I've seen buildings with mold on the walls and bat guano everywhere," Fleming said. "Buildings have had electrical fires, and one building recently had the plaster drop 20 feet. We've had parts of the outside fall off the buildings. It's really quite amazing nobody's been hurt."
Other courthouses were renovated so drastically that the original architecture is unrecognizable. In an effort to make the buildings more modern, counties leveled Victorian-style roofs, replaced wooden doors with glass and aluminum ones, sold off clock towers and bell towers and painted white over the original historic interior paint colors, Fleming said.
The 1960s and early 70s were a time of urban renewal in Texas, and many counties demolished their courthouses altogether, Fleming said.
In 1973, the Texas Legislature passed legislation that required counties to contact the THC six months prior to any demolition or alteration, she said.
"We are the only state that has a law protecting its county historic courthouses," Fleming said. "Other states are at the mercy of each individual local government. Since 1975, no county courthouses have been demolished in Texas."
Texas charm
Even with this law in place, in 1998, the "historic courthouses of Texas" ended up on the National Trust's 11 Most Endangered Places list. The National Trust is a nonprofit organization that advocates historic preservation.
Following this designation, the 1999 Texas Legislature established the Texas Historic Courthouse Preservation Program. Counties then had a financial resource for restoring these historic buildings as well as a law preventing their destruction.
"Our program is all about making the courthouse function for county government," Fleming said. "We bring it up to date from an electrical standpoint. We do some beautiful things like recreate clock towers and re-carve sandstone if it's been damaged, but we spend a lot of our money making the building come back up to standard as a quality work environment."
When restoring the architectural quality of the buildings, THC focuses on "character-defining features," such as the historic paint colors and ceiling and floor finishes, Fleming said.
"We've found some really interesting and diverse surfaces, like different tiles that we didn't know were used so commonly in Texas," she said. "There's been a lot of detail and variety in these buildings that has been diffused over the years, and we try to bring that back. That's what gives it the charm that Texas courthouses are known for."
Economic engine
The renovated courthouses inspire community pride and create an economic boost for the county, like they did when they were originally built, Fleming said.
Joe White, Ellis County engineer, said that Ellis County benefits from increased tourism since its courthouse renovation wrapped up in 2002.
"We have tours all the time," White said. "There's not a day that goes by that there's not people laying on the sidewalk so they can take pictures of it. It's an economic engine for the community."
Fleming agrees that economic revitalization occurs along with the renovations.
"The courthouses, when they fell into disrepair as many of them did, became sort of symbolic of a downtown that was in a state of decay. And when the buildings have been renewed, then property owners around the courthouse catch the same fever, and then the courthouse square becomes a magnet for tourists and economic activity."
Angela Freeman
Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts | Window on State Government |