MANSFIELD, Ohio — The L-2 floor, located at the Richland County Courthouse and Administration building, has been vacant since 2008.
"If I were standing here 20 years ago, I would be in a jail cell," said Richland County administrator Andrew Keller.
The county jail called this level of the building home from 1968 until 2008, when a new state-of-the-art facility was built.
After the move, the county used the jail cells as storage for county records and other junk.
"We had boxes of records that were stored in there," said Commissioner Cliff Mears. "The jail hadn't been used for quite a while, but the cells were still down there; we needed additional space."
The COVID-19 pandemic is what made county officials realize they needed a new space for Grand Jury hearings and a fourth courtroom.
"This is so much nicer than they had," said Mears.
County officials cut the ribbon right before Thanksgiving on the 9,000-square-foot addition.
The cost to renovate the jail was $1.6 million. The money came from American Rescue Plan Act funds.
The cells that housed the county's worst offenders are gone, in their place are new walls and desks—even a new break room for Clerk of Courts employees, bulletproof glass and security cameras.
"I don't know if there's a lot of the history that's being maintained on there because it's a pretty sweeping renovation," said Mears. "But it's going to be state-of-the-art security for our people because that's important these days, the times that we live in."
There is also a new grand jury room that will double as a conference room for county business.
"I mean, it's a quantum leap, from what it was," said Mears.
The old Clerk of Courts Office is now in the process of being turned into that fourth courtroom.
