The Board of Estimates temporarily put the brakes on a plan to build a new courtroom and judge’s chambers in the Clarence M. Mitchell Jr. Courthouse after City Council President Bernard C. “Jack” Young questioned the amount of money it would cost.

The spending panel was asked today to approve a request to transfer $1.2 million from a reserve fund to an active fund that could be used to complete the project. The source of the money was a voter-approved bond issue known as the Sixth Public Building Loan.

“The court system has been allocated another judge and therefore needs another courtroom,” the Department of General Services, who requested the transfer, said in a memo to the board. “The court system does not have enough larger courtrooms and the courtroom will be of the larger variety.”

A staff member to Young, who serves as president of the spending panel, said Young “had concerns about spending so much” to make improvements in a building that is in poor shape.

Subject of Complaints

The staffer said Young wanted more time to find out why General Services requested more than $1 million and how it would be spent.

Over the years, the courthouse, located two blocks west of City Hall, has been the subject of complaints from judges, jurors and others about everything from the way the general public crosses paths with people awaiting trial to the way its heating, air conditioning and plumbing systems work – or fail to work.

The city has commissioned at least two comprehensive studies about upgrading or replacing the circuit court building, but no major projects have come out of those studies. More than 30 Circuit Court judges currently have courtrooms and chambers inside the building.

In light of Young’s concerns, the board today deferred a vote on the spending request until its next meeting.

Many “No” Votes

In addition to holding up the vote involving the courthouse, Young uncharacteristically voted “no” on 10 other spending requests on today’s agenda.

They included a $415,000 maintenance agreement with Scheidt & Bachmann for more than a dozen city garages, an amendment to a consulting agreement with the HAKS Engineering, and a health care consulting contract with the Segal Company.

Young also voted against a $4 million contract for ferric chloride for use in treating wastewater, a consulting engineer contract for up to $4 million with Alpha Corp., a contract with Penn Credit Corp. to collect delinquent parking fines, and “task assignments” to Rummel, Klepper & Kahl, Whitman, Requardt and Associates and McCormick Taylor by the Department of Transportation totaling $546,558.

The contracts were approved by the other Board of Estimates members, including Comptroller Joan Pratt and Finance Director Henry Raymond, who voted on behalf of an absent Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake.