The Morton County Commission has been talking for years about expansion of the Law Enforcement Center and have now decided to move forward with a possible 2008 construction.

Sheriff Dave Shipman and Emergency Manager Tammy Harris approached the commissioners at Tuesday's meeting hoping to get some action on expansion plans. Architect Al Fitterer provided some preliminary drawings, along with some cost estimates for a communications center expansion on the southeast side of the LEC.

"I've been for this project all along," Commissioner Matt Erhardt said. "It's really a shame to be doing it now when interest rates are going up. We'll be paying 6 or 7 percent rather than the 3 or 4 percent we could've gotten just last year."

Total cost of the project, which includes remodeling of the existing lobby and a jail security systems upgrade, was put at $2.1 million.

The expansion would allow the seven deputies, who were moved from the basement of the LEC into the courthouse, to move back into the LEC and also provide room for the Emergency Management department, which is now in the basement of the courthouse.

"There are a lot of problems with the current center," Harris said. "For one, we don't know the source of the electrical shocks the dispatchers have been getting. The equipment is outdated, it's very noisy, temperature control is awful; it's just a bad room."

Harris is planning for some $335,000 to be spent for new equipment for the communications center, including four 911 stations. This cost is not included in the expansion construction. Harris said there is about $100,000 available for the equipment, perhaps more in the upcoming Federal Emergency Management grant fund, which should be known sometime in July or August.

"I hope you have a plan to phase this in, because I don't know where all the money is going to come from," Commissioner Dick Tokach said.

Harris said she wants to start replacing some of the equipment now, with intentions of moving it to the new communications center when it's completed. As far as phasing in the equipment, Harris said that will be up to the commission.

There are two ways that the county can go about financing the project, auditor Paul Trauger said. There is the traditional bonding, which would have to go to a vote of the county residents.

Another option would be to go through the building authority created by the commission for past building projects. The authority can bond the project without the need for a vote, and the building would be leased back to the county until it was paid off. Most of the commissioners sit on the authority. The process also could be used to pay for the equipment needed.

Trauger said he does want to meet with Mandan administration to consider their use of the building and an appropriate rental agreement. He also said that the commission should consider plans to increase the number of cells in the building.

Trauger estimated total cost of this project at about $3.5 million, but the county could just pour the footing and build the shell for that expansion for about $1 million.

Shipman said that the 20 additional cells provided by the expansion will be little more than a Band-Aid for the increase in incarceration being seen. Erhardt said that the county was looking at alternative sentencing, including the use of electronic surveillance, which is now allowed by state law. Companies offering the service say it will increase jail space by 20 percent.

Officials representing the Mandan Remediation Trust and Leggette, Brashears and Graham, the company managing the remediation effort, said that a remote manifold (diesel fuel collection point) will be built in an area that is now planned to be a conference room in the LEC expansion.

The commission also is hoping that, since they've had to give up use of the basement of the LEC because of problems with diesel fumes, that the Mandan Remediation Trust might help fund some of the expansion.

Commissioner Mark Bitz said he will meet with the LEC building committee to come up with a recommendation for the trust. Bitz suggested that the building committee again start meeting regularly so as not to allow the LEC project to fall by the wayside.

Commissioner Jim Boehm's motion to have architectural plans for both the addition of the communication center and detention center drawn up was unanimously approved. Boehm said he expects that, once the plans are in hand, the commission will consider possible financing plans.

(Reach reporter Gordon Weixel at 250-8255 or gordon.weixel@;bismarcktribune.com.)