Cape Girardeau County commission OKs Phase II environmental study of county jail

Cape Girardeau County commissioners Clint Tracy, Paul Koeper and Charlie Herbst have voted to pay Trutest Solutions of Cape Girardeau County $6,486 to do an environmental assessment of the county jail in Jackson.

"Trutest was the lowest and best bid and it will look at what we call the old jail, built in 1979, and the newer one, built in 2000 -- which are now interconnected," said 2nd District Commissioner Herbst, who added he expects a completed study to be done in "the next month or so."

This week's Trutest authorization comes after the commission voted Oct. 14 to authorize St. Louis-headquartered Sitex to do a similar assessment of the now-vacant 1908 county Courthouse, which the commission intends to use for some future purpose. The county will pay Sitex $6,670 for its work.

The 113-year-old former Courthouse in uptown Jackson has been largely empty since the new facility at 203 N. High St. opened in 2020.

Both environmental assessments -- Phase I (old Courthouse) and Phase II (jail) -- will be forwarded to Navigate Building Solutions of St. Louis, a consulting firm, which is working off a $208,420 contract with the county to provide a facility study to be delivered in the first quarter of next year.

"(Navigate's study) will project out for us what it thinks we'll need 25 years from now," Herbst said.

Comparison

"The Cape Girardeau schools went through a similar analysis with old Franklin Elementary some years back using a consultant and engineers," Herbst recalled.

"They looked at what it would take to renovate that structure and decided a better use of taxpayer money was to build new. But in this case, (the old Courthouse) is a good, safe building with available space. We've had structural engineers look at it twice in the last 10 years, but this analysis will be more in-depth. We know it's a good (building) but now, we need to find out what it is good for."

The environmental assessments are a necessary part of the process, Herbst said.

"This is standard in older buildings, you have to make sure it's safe before you can have it remediated," he said.