- Montezuma County officials are hoping for a spring groundbreaking for the new courthouse to be built south of the Sheriff’s Office and Detention Center in Cortez.
- A federal judge has ordered that voting districts for the San Juan County, Utah, school board must be redrawn because they are unconstitutional.
Montezuma County officials are hoping for a spring groundbreaking for the new courthouse to be built south of the Sheriff’s Office and Detention Center in Cortez. Administrator Melissa Brunner tells KSJD the county was successful in obtaining a $586,000 grant from the state Underfunded Courthouse Facility Commission as well as a $2 million grant from the Department of Local Affairs. The county will use reserves and its capital fund to pay remaining costs for the projected 31,000-square-foot building, expected to cost around $7 million to $8 million. Montezuma is the only county remaining in Colorado whose district and county courts are in separate locations and the state says that needs to change.
A federal judge has ordered that voting districts for the San Juan County, Utah, school board must be redrawn because they are unconstitutional. The Navajo Nation had sued the county, saying the current districts violate the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution. The county has five school-board districts and one member is elected from each. The districts vary in population from 3,285 to 2,195. On December 9th, U.S. District Judge Robert Shelby ruled that because they are so unequal, they violate the concept of one person, one vote. The districts have not been redrawn since being set in 1992.
