County courthouse is coming

Construction On A New Hoke County Courthouse To Start This Summer In Downtown Raeford

Silling Architects and Metcon Buildings and Infrastructure expect to break ground this summer on the new Hoke County courthouse, a project demonstrating what local government can accomplish when it collaborates with state legislators to meet a community need.

The new three-story building will sit on the empty lot between Edinborough Avenue and East Elwood Avenue on Main Street. The design anchors the county’s civic footprint with the surrounding jailhouse and other county administrative and judicial buildings.

The courthouse project’s current projected cost is $33.5 million, $31 million of which the state awarded through a grant last year. Hoke County Commissioner Harry Southerland said the remaining funds are in the county budget. A second project, a connecting administration building, has $8 million of county funds assigned based on current estimates. The county is keeping $5 million in reserve for contingencies.

“We want you to see where your money’s going,” Hoke County Commissioner Henry Southerland said, referencing taxpayers. “You’ll see the downtown landscape change for the future and your tax dollars at work, thanks to all the partners in this venture.”

The courthouse design features a

51,000-square-foot building with a connecting walkway to the jailhouse on the first floor. The first floor will also house the clerk of courts office, clerk’s hearing room, and a jury assembly room which will also act as a traffic court.

The second floor includes two courtrooms, the public defender’s office, and jury deliberation rooms. The third floor consists of two courtrooms, judges’ offices, and defendant holding spaces. There is also a small area for the district attorney to work onsite when needed.

The principal architect, Tom Potts of Silling, said the security of the building is its top feature, especially compared to the historic courthouse.

“It’s a more secure courthouse for the public, staff, and in-custody defendants,” Potts said. “Our culture has changed; the population is bigger. We need bigger spaces and more organized circulation.”

The building’s technological accommodations are better suited to modern litigation and evidence presentation, and the building itself is more energy sustainable. Video conferencing will be more accessible, and the end goal is for trials to be more effective, according to Potts.

The administration building, designed by Silling and constructed by MSquare Construction, will add 19,000 square feet of workspace for the county seat. Construction on the courthouse will begin first, with the completion of both projects aimed at the summer of 2025.

The administration building will accommodate the county tax collector and assessor, human resources, finance and IT departments for the county. A new county commissioners’ boardroom is included, along with more administrative offices for future growth.

The design includes a public promenade to link the historic courthouse to the new buildings.

The current courthouse, designed by Milburn, Heister & Company, was built in 1911. The county outgrew the space years ago, and in 2019 the legal overload was made worse when Hoke and Moore Counties were combined into one judicial district. According to Commissioner Southerland, trials that should have taken a month are backlogged by several months because of too few courtrooms.

In 2019, a Hoke County grand jury report found numerous issues, including outdated spaces and unsafe conditions. Moore and Hoke Counties Senior Resident Superior Court Judge James Webb requested a safety report from the court system’s safety and continuity of operations manager. That report recommended employees leave the building.

“The need for a new courthouse was immediate,” Webb said. “Then Covid hit.”

Webb turned the issue of building a new courthouse over to the county commission. In 2022, commissioners met with District 48 Representative Garland Pierce, who was receptive to the need for funding for a new courthouse. Further talks with State Senators Ben Clark and Danny Britt resulted in more bipartisan financial support, resulting in the 2022 grant.

Parking space is still being negotiated, with ideas to modify street parking and make alterations to the area around the courthouse. Commissioners expect to break ground and officially start construction in summer of 2023.

By Faith Hatton

From BOOM, page 1

401 and beyond.

Real Estate Developer and Consultant Charles Morris has been a key player in establishing the foundation for this rapid growth, helping to get the Conditional Use District passed by Hoke County leadership, and most importantly, leading the way for a strong anchor for other businesses, residential developments and more to build around.

The FirstHealth Moore Regional Hospital Hoke Campus lies at the center of the development plans. After coming to the area, the campus has brought the necessary jobs, medical services, and infrastructure to make other developments possible.

“In a mixed-use conditional use district, it's kind of its own governance. It has its own rules, setbacks, vegetative spaces, and then we did a concept ‘A’ and a concept ‘B’, and this was the [Hoke FirstHealth] hospital. They took 30 acres and then we sold them an additional six out here, so they own all this now. We want them to be successful,” shared Morris.

Morris also serves as head of development facilitation for the Williams family who own what is officially known as The Williams Family Tract, 196 acres of land located along Highway 401 between Johnson Mill Road and North Parker Church Road. As the property began to be purchased for development and plans began to pour in, Morris said he has helped the developers and the Williams family facilitate plans that allow for all parties to meet their needs and wants for what they want the future to look like as they bring in more mainstream builds and businesses. Morris said that a large emphasis has been put on making sure there is a small town feel in the look and designs of commercial buildings coming to the community.

“That’s what the family wants. Because they all feel like this was something from their grandparents and their parents. And then they’re going to put their fingerprint on society. Ed Williams is really adamant that this does not look like just a traditional, slap it down development,” shared Morris.

By providing the critical infrastructure, the new district has opened the floodgates for both residential and commercial construction to begin, so much so that Cumberland based builders are setting their sights on having multiple projects in Hoke County.

Ben Stout, CEO of Fayetteville based Ben Stout Construction, which has a number of projects in development in Hoke, said that Hoke County has made it easy to develop, with County and City officials working with builders to rezone and get the proper permits quickly and efficiently which allows for a safe investment.

“In Hoke County, I think one of the things that stands out is that you know if you’re going to spend money, you’re going to not have as many channels and hurdles to overcome to get rezoned to meet your needs. So, the money that you invest upfront, you know you'd be able to recoup because you have confidence that you're going to get the project done,” shared Stout.

Other contractors have agreed that the municipal laws in place have also made Hoke County a safe and more profitable investment.

Ralph Huff, owner of Coldwell Banker Advantage and former owner of H&H Homes, currently with Huff Family Office, has over 45 years of real estate experience in Fayetteville and the surrounding areas. Huff shared that material and construction requirements in the Hoke area’s Unified Development Ordinances are more cost effective and achievable. This can make or break a construction company’s plans, with builders seeing an increase in prices on everything from construction materials to labor costs.

“Most all municipalities have a Unified Development Ordinance and when they do, it normally sets back the ability to develop for a decade. But what we did in Hoke County is, once they adapted it and we saw the impact of it, we met with Hoke County, and they changed five or six things in there that made the cost of developing the lots untenable. They worked with the builders and developers to help modify the UDO which was over the top,” shared Huff. “Hoke County has always been relatively easy to deal with because I'm from Hoke County and I know all the pieces of the puzzles over there. I have done so much work over there that when I speak, they understand that I’m not trying to pull something over on them.”

Co-Owner of A&G Residential Wells Alderman currently has projects in four neighborhoods under development in Hoke County, with more projects already being planned for the future.

“Hoke County has always been on our radar. Like any county or any project, some opportunities are better than others. Since we've started in 2019, one of the first houses we built was in Hoke County, and Hoke County has always been a part of our business model,” shared Alderman. “When you drive down [Highway] 401 and you see that new aquatic center that just opened, and you see the amount of money that they put into that. That to me shows the growth that the county is doing, you see all these different projects that are going up.”

Hoke County leaders say they are all on one page in regard to getting projects to come and be completed in their area, with multiple community developments moving through the proper channels, and using both local and out of county contractors to find the best way to get the job done and benefit everyone.

“If we say we want to build a courthouse, the goal is to build a courthouse. Okay, we look at ‘how can we do it economically?’ And then while we’re doing that, we want to put our business community first. When we do that, we get to hire locally, so we get to hire some local painters, some contract workers, the money stays in our community,” shared Hoke County Commissioner Harry Southerland. “It’s going to our schools, helping out the school system, it’s going into our grocery stores and going to convenience stores buying gas, so we keep the money, not all of it, but most of it locally. And when you do that, those dollars keep turning in your account at least seven times. When you do that, you can expand and grow.”