Leak damages Spokane County Courthouse offices

It may have been a hot and dry weekend in Spokane County, but inside, its historic courthouse offices were flooding.

A poor pipe fitting dripped unchecked all weekend, said Spokane County Facilities Director Ron Oscarson. The offices of commissioners Shelly O’Quinn and Al French received water damage to the carpets and ceiling, but the setback shouldn’t affect plans for the family courtrooms’ move to the second floor later this month.

Oscarson said the leak was tiny, but over the weekend the amount of water dripping through the ceiling added up. He compared the amount of water that was dripping out to the spigot on a garden hose that’s not screwed on all the way.

“When you have that going on over the whole gol dang weekend, it’s enough to get the offices below wet,” he said.

Oscarson predicted repairs will cost several thousand dollars, but there was no structural damage or loss of historical county documents, he said.

“This hurts,” he added.

Renovations have been underway at the courthouse, which turns 120 years old this year, for several months. The law library on the second floor recently reopened to the public and the family law courtrooms were nearing completion when the leak was discovered. Those courtrooms, which will move from the first to the second floor, will still open this month, Oscarson said, but a judge will likely have to continue using his first-floor office while the pipe is repaired, Oscarson said.

The project, for which the county allocated about $714,000, also included structural repairs to the building, Oscarson said.

O’Quinn’s office received the greatest amount of water damage, said Martha Lou Wheatley-Billeter, spokeswoman for Spokane County. Some meetings will need to be rescheduled, she said, and the commissioner lost a pair of drawings of her children in the flood.

With all the work going on, Oscarson said he’d made a habit of dropping by the courthouse on weekends. He elected not to do so Saturday and Sunday.

“I doubt if I’d have gone into that particular room,” he said. “But I can’t help thinking, dang, I could have been there earlier and prevented half the damage.”