State Pledges Funds for Courthouse Expansion, Renovation : Judicial: The new facility will be shared by Municipal and Superior courts. Work may have to start next year.

Funds will soon be available for renovation and expansion of the run-down, crowded Santa Monica courthouse, state officials said last week.

But construction of a new home for the Santa Monica Municipal Court and the West Division of Los Angeles Superior Court may not begin until next year, when the city of Santa Monica issues development guidelines for its entire Civic Center complex.

News of the promised $52-million funding cheered jurists at the courthouse, which was built in 1954 and renovated in 1964.

“If there’s enough money, I’d like to have a skyscraper,” said David Rothman, supervising judge of the Superior Court, which holds some of its sessions in so-called “temporary trailers” that were installed 12 years ago.

It’s more likely that the renovated courthouse will not be much higher than the existing three-story building, although it is expected to spread out over space occupied by the trailers, nearly doubling the existing 140,000-square-foot floor area, city officials said.

The money was originally intended for just the Municipal Court, while county officials spoke of seeking a new home for the Superior Court elsewhere on the Westside.

But they were frustrated by the high cost of land. Rothman credited the decision to include the Superior Court in the renovated building to County Supervisor Ed Edelman and to Rex Minter, presiding judge of the Municipal Court.

“To refurbish and build additional space for both courts here is a tremendous savings of money, because you already have both courts in one facility,” Rothman said.

Minter did not return several phone calls, but Joel Bellman, a spokesman for Edelman, said the supervisor hopes to keep the costs the same as they would have been under the original plans to redo just the Municipal Court.

Teri Burns, an aide to state Sen. Alan Robbins (D-Tarzana), said the release of the $52 million can be expected sometime after the Legislature reconvenes Aug. 19.

The money, held in a $300-million courthouse construction fund, will come from $2 courthouse construction surcharges added to fines for traffic violations and other misdemeanors, most of which come from municipal courts, she said.

Despite the promise of funding, it will be a while before carpenters’ hammers replace judges’ gavels at the courthouse on 2nd Street, just south of the Santa Monica Freeway.

After two years of deliberations, a city committee has yet to come up with its recommendations for the future of the area, which also includes the Santa Monica City Hall, the Police Department, the Civic Auditorium and the headquarters of the RAND Corp.

But a report is expected to go the City Council early next year, said Paul Berlant, director of planning for the city, and the council’s passage of a site-specific plan would allow work to go ahead.

“The courthouse is part and parcel of that whole area, and the alternatives we are looking at would allow it to double in size,” Berlant said.

The project would also include the RAND Corp.’s controversial plans for a major expansion of its Ocean Avenue headquarters, complete with 300,000 square feet of commercial space and 900 residential units.

Rothman said that although no plans have been prepared for the courthouse, he expects it to have Spartan furnishings, with much of the money going for expensive security precautions and other architectural requirements unique to courthouses.

He said the two courts have been working together more closely in the last year, especially since the U.S. Supreme Court required that all arrests must be reviewed by a magistrate within 48 hours.

The courts will be even more dependent on each other after the passage of a statewide court reform program being worked out in Sacramento.

Among other changes, the planned reforms would give Municipal Court judges the authority to sentence criminals in felony cases if a guilty plea is made in their courts. It also authorizes Superior Court judges to hear misdemeanor cases, which are now restricted to Municipal Courts.