The City of Salem recently condemned the property located on Courthouse Square. The condemnation came after the transit mall, underground parking and north block site were closed for public use on July 2. Afterward county workers heard a loud bang from within the walls, which resulted in Marion County to begin planning for evacuation of the building. They now have less than 60 days to vacate the “dangerous building.”
Courthouse Square was constructed for $34 million. The cost of repairs and even the possibility of repairs is unknown at this time. According to Marion County staff, the Marion County Commissioners will get a report in the fall detailing the options.
Settling the unsettled
As early as December 2009, Marion County and Salem area Mass Transit began the process of settling lawsuits that were filed as a result of the construction defects at the soon-to-be evacuated Courthouse Square.
In January 2010, all parties settled with Salem-based architectural firm Arbuckle Costic for $695,000.
In mid-April 2010 they also agreed to settle with Pence/Kelly Construction, who has worked on other Salem projects like the Salem Conference Center and 295 Church Street, and their subcontractors. Pence/Kelly paid $900,000, while their subcontractors settled between $40,000 and $60,000. The total settlement was approximately $1.8 million.
Pence/Kelly has paid the most out of all the defendants so far, but their attorney, Jack Levy, said that it doesn’t mean that they’ve accepted any fault for the problems.
“There’s always a transaction cost for litigation. We settled out of court for consideration of the potential costs – it could’ve easily been one million dollars,” said Levy.
Levy said that the subcontractors “played a better game of poker” but the difference in cost did not equate to any type of fault.
Vice President of Arbuckle Costic Clayton Vorse said that his company was advised by their attorney and liability insurance to offer a settlement to the county to remove them from the claim.
“We did that without admitting any wrongdoing,” said Vorse.
The last remaining defendant is Century West Engineering. It is anticipated that the maximum amount of liability insurance for Century West is $1 million. County and transit officials, and Century West are scheduled to begin mediation later this month.
Court documents show that as early as May 2007 the repairs would exceed the amount of settlements that have already been made. Months after the settlements were signed off on, the building was found to be unsafe. The bus mall was closed and moved to a temporary location, retail locations were given eviction notices and county offices were told that they would be moving out of the building.
Jason Freilinger, who is running for Marion County Commissioner Position 1 against sitting Commissioner Patti Milne, believes that it may have been too early for the county to have signed off on an agreement with the contractors.
“I realize that with the levels of legal liability … we are not going to be able to have the building replaced or fixed by the contractor. We are not going to be able to go to court and get the taxpayers’ money back for the cost of the building,” he said.
Will taxpayers be footing the bill for repairs? Marion County Commissioner Janet Carlson, who signed at least one of the settlement agreements, said that she wasn’t comfortable answering that question due to its tone.
Freilinger, however, was able to answer: “The voters are gonna end up paying a big bill for that repair.”
Henderson said that a change in the way contractor liability is handled for future projects is under review now, but that no changes in the process had been made at time of Salem Weekly’s deadline.
The blame game
With two plaintiffs and a revolving door of defendants, it’s not hard to believe that there is a lot of finger pointing when it comes to who is at fault.
“It wasn’t the construction. It was an engineering issue. Our client did a good job building a building,” Levy said.
When asked who was to blame, Levy had an answer.
“Someone who worked for Century West. I don’t remember his name … he has since passed away. He had the same problem come up with the Salem Hospital parking structure years ago. The same guy designed both buildings,” he said.
According to a 2001 lawsuit between Salem Hospital and a number of defendants including Century West, the hospital discovered defects in a parking garage that was completed in 1998.
The lawsuit stated: “Investigation revealed that foundation footings, columns, shear walls, and concrete slabs within the structure were improperly designed and overstressed.”
It goes on to say that the “strength capability of the post-tension slabs was adequate, but the post-tension slabs were inadequately designed in terms of punching sheer and deflections.”
The accusations are very similar to allegations by Pence/Kelly in the lawsuit concerning Courthouse Square:
“Century West’s design work on those slabs failed to meet the applicable standard of care under the circumstances that the slabs were defectively designed in that they are insufficiently thick relative to their span and were designed with insufficient and inadequate post-tensioning relative to their span, and that structural calculations were incomplete.”
The lawsuit between Salem Hospital and Century West was settled outside of court. Salem Hospital was unable to comment on details of the settlement, due to a confidentiality agreement.
“The way we can describe it is that we were fully satisfied with the settlement we received,” said Julie Howard, spokesperson for Salem Hospital.
In a court filing dated September 25, 2001, Salem Hospital was seeking approximately $1.3 million in damages to remedy the defects. The actual settlement amount was undisclosed.
According to Vorse, Arbuckle Costic hired Century West as a structural consultant on the Courthouse Square project. They paid the engineering firm $98,262 for work on the project, according to court documents.
“They were not supervised by us. They were working alongside us. Their project engineer who stamped and signed the drawings, Mike Hayford, passed away prior to the project being completed,” Vorse said.
It is unclear who was in charge of supervising the work performed by Century West outside of their own organization.
Neither Century West nor their legal representation were available for comment before Salem Weekly’s deadline.
Century West is the only remaining defendant of the Courthouse Square lawsuit. However, when it comes to the cause of the problems, Marion County officials are not ready to point to a single company.
Steve Dickey, director of transportation development at Salem-Keizer Transit, said, “The analysis and evaluation are not complete yet; it would be premature to make a statement of ultimate responsibility.”
“We’ve been pretty clear that there were design, construction and material problems. A lot of parties have contributed to it,” said Henderson.
Vorse agreed that the problem was between three areas, but with one variation. He listed structural design, execution of the building of the structure and the inspection and testing involved in the building.
“I don’t think you can point your finger at one particular person,” he said.
Freilinger believes that lack of oversight by Marion County added to the problems.
“Marion County has its own building inspection department and plan examiners, but county commissioners made the decision they would not let their own staff review the integrity of the building,” said Freilinger. He also said that Salem Mass Area Transit wanted to have surveillance at the job site, but that county commissioners denied the request due to budgetary concerns.
He said that Marion County hired a Los Angeles engineering firm to reduce costs, yet still meet the building codes.
“We don’t have any recollection of a Los Angeles firm. That doesn’t mean it didn’t happen, we just don’t have any recollection of it,” said Henderson.
Salem Weekly could not obtain information on a Los Angeles firm from outside parties.
“I was the plans examiner for Marion County and that’s been almost eight years ago. I didn’t review the plans [for Courthouse Square], they were reviewed by the City of Salem,” said Tarno Coleman, who is now retired from Marion County and teaching at Chemeketa Community College.
Freilinger said, “The process of making sure that the construction of the project was done right those were two major factors that were flawed.”
“We were in the old Senator Hotel and they moved us out to East Salem [when they were building Courthouse Square] so I didn’t have much contact while it was being built,” said Coleman.
Freilinger said that Marion County’s current staff is not to blame, but that instead taxpayers should look to the commissioners.
“It’s an example of when commissioners have not relied on their staff and made decisions they were not qualified to make,” he said.
Building economy
Cottage Street is now home to the bus rider traffic that used to linger in the bus mall. After the immediate closure of Courthouse Square’s bus mall, the bus stops were moved to Capitol Mall and then moved again to make way for the Hoopla basketball tournament.
James Dakton, a bus rider, hasn’t missed any rides. As he was sitting under the sun on the middle of Cottage Street, he said regarding the new station, “It’s all right. There’s no cover, but it’s fine.”
The location at Cottage Street is temporary and plans are in the works to move the buses again, this time to a more permanent location.
“The interim plan is to be located on Union Street between High and Liberty, closing that section of Union Street for buses only,” said Dickey.
He said that the location will depend on the final outcome at Courthouse Square. Plans include a station being located at Union Street for the next two to three years.
“We set a tentative target of starting service there the first of November. We’ll be doing more than Cottage Street,” Dickey said.
Mike Gambiano is the owner of Dog Zilla, a business that has benefited from the transit move. He moved his hot dog cart to Court and Cottage, following the temporary bus station. He has since been enjoying the business of drivers and riders alike.
“I’d say it’s better for the drivers. They used to go inside their cabin and they didn’t interact with other people. Now they’re talking to the riders. They seem to enjoy it, to embrace it.”
Gambiano said the bus drivers like his hot dogs so much they’ve requested him to follow them once again when they move to the more permanent station. He will.
“They’re happy with us being here and we’re happy to be here,” he said.
In addition to the Salem-Keizer Transit offices and transit mall, two restaurants that are housed on the first floor of the building will be moved or closed.
One of those restaurants is Trinh’s Cuisine, a Vietnamese restuarant that moved into Courthouse Square in 2005.
“I opened in Lancaster Mall in 1990. It was expensive to move. We started doing good but then the economy hit and now structural [problems],” said Mung Trinh, owner of Trinh’s Cuisine.
Salem-Keizer Transit is Trinh’s landlord. He said that it will cost about $100,000 to move his restaurant. Currently Trinh is working with his insurance company to see if a claim can be made. But he’s unsure whether he’ll be able to afford to move to a different location.
“I don’t want to sue them [Salem-Keizer Transit] because we’re like a family. Also, lawsuits cost money and taxpayer’s money too,” he said. “I’m pretty upset but there’s nothing I can do. It’s all right; life goes on. It’s not their fault, it was kind of an accident. “
The Beanery, also on the first floor of Courthouse Square was closed shortly after the 90-day notice was given to vacate. Allann Bros. Coffee, who owns the coffee shop, declined to comment on their closure.
Lastly, Marion County offices will need to be moved as well.
As far as the move, Henderson said that Marion County is working on planning their exit now.
Henderson said that staffers will be moving into smaller offices and that the District Attorney’s office will be shifting into the courthouse.
“Public works people at Courthouse Square are going to move to the public works campus on Silverton Road. The planning and permits and buildings inspectors are moving there.”
The Marion County vault, where clerk’s records are held, will stay in the courthouse, but the clerk’s office will shift out of the courthouse. But Henderson said that the new location is unknown.
“We have a lot of vacant buildings in Salem right now because of the economy. There needs to be a thorough review of what land is available and most efficient and most cost effective,” said Freilinger.
