JACKSON -- The Jackson Preservation Alliance delivered its $25,000 bond Friday morning, successfully maintaining the temporary restraining order preventing Jackson County from demolishing the older portion of its Resource Center.
"We just can't believe it, how people just came out of the woodwork and gave," said Cathy Buxengard, president of the Jackson Preservation Alliance. "Right now we're just so excited and so thrilled."
People who had already been members of the Alliance donated funds for the restraining order and donations were also collected by going door-to-door. Through the donations process, the group also added to its membership, increasing its ranks from the previous membership of nearly 60 people.
The largest donation was $4,000.
The Preservation Alliance submitted its $25,000 as a condition of the temporary restraining order preventing the county from demolishing the building. The Alliance and Jackson County will present their arguments during a hearing before Judge Douglas Richards at 9 a.m. Nov. 30 at the Jackson County Courthouse, and Richards will then determine whether to issue a temporary injunction pending another hearing that would likely begin some time in 2011.
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The Jackson County Resource Center, built as a school mostly in 1938 and 1962, has been a bone of contention in Jackson County for at least seven years. The building was purchased from the local school district and used to house county offices, both on a permanent basis and on a temporary basis while the adjacent Jackson County Courthouse was being renovated.
The existing Resource Center has 82,900 square feet over three city blocks, according to a report by Wold Architects and Engineers. A portion of that space is not easily converted into office space, such as the school shop rooms, kitchens and locker rooms, and significant remodeling would have to be done in order to bring the building up to code -- adding elevators, creating handicapped accessibility and removing asbestos.
"We bought the building in 2002," said Jackson County Attorney Bob O'Connor. "The reason we bought it wasn't because we wanted the building. It was because we wanted the land next to the courthouse."
After multiple committees studied the Resource Center and submitted reports and recommendations to the Jackson County Board of Commissioners, the commissioners decided the 1938 building did not meet the county's needs, and opted to demolish it and build a new Resource Center, which would include the county's human services department.
The county initially attempted to fund its Resource Center project through bonds, but voters defeated the bonding measure at the polls. Instead, commissioners decided to pay for the project with funds set aside for the purpose, wind project revenue and tax money from businesses whose JOBZ tax relief was expiring.
"We've spent seven or eight years now looking at various options and looking at alternative uses, and nothing's come up," O'Connor said. "No developers have come forward and said 'I want to convert this into apartments or condos.'"
The Preservation Alliance's strategy for stopping the demolition of the Resource Center hinges on the Minnesota Environmental Rights Act, which would apply to the building if it can be shown to be both historically significant and in danger of impairment or destruction.
"So all we have to show is that (the Resource Center) is a resource protected by MERA. And the Minnesota Supreme Court has held that a property is historically significant if it would be qualified for listing on the National Register of Historic Places," said Mark Anfinson, attorney for the Jackson Preservation Alliance. "And the court has said the property doesn't already have to be on the National Register, but it just has to be eligible for listing if it's nominated, and that's what our people will be focusing on."
