The current Smith County Courthouse. (Santana Wood/Tyler Morning Telegraph File)

Editor’s Note: This is part of a series of stories on local governments entities’ successes in 2023 and goals for 2024.

Downtown Tyler is known as the central hub of the city, but it also functions as the Smith County seat. The county seat is the location of the county government. Typically, a county seat is the largest, oldest, or most centrally located town or city in a county.

County government includes the county commissioners court; elected officials, including the county and district clerks, treasurer, and tax assessor-collector; law enforcement officials such as the district attorney, sheriff and constables; and various departments like human resources, information technology, purchasing, roads and bridges, and veterans services.

Since taking office in November 2022, County Judge Neal Franklin has launched projects to create a cohesive downtown campus for better accessibility to services, preservation of history, mental health promotion and employee retention.

In 2023, Franklin initiated steps to achieve these objectives that will ramp up in 2024.

Downtown campus

Smith County has needed a new courthouse for over 20 years. The current courthouse, designed for two courtrooms in 1955, now accommodates eight, posing safety concerns and nearing capacity.

“The next goal is to continue planning the downtown area with the City of Tyler,” Franklin said. “The whole downtown area is just going to change. It is really going to be anew.”

Smith County officials broke ground in October on a five-story parking garage, which will house more than 540 parking spaces for members of the public, county employees and jurors.

It was the kickoff for a project that took years of work.

The $19 million parking garage is part of a voter-approved bond project, including the new county courthouse. The courthouse and parking structure bond package totals $179 million.

The design plan spans about 3 acres from College Avenue to Fannin Avenue. The east and west sides will connect seamlessly with a community space leading toward the new Smith County Courthouse.

A green space will feature a multi-use structure with storage, restrooms and an amphitheater.

To improve pedestrian safety and promote outdoor dining experiences, the sidewalks adjacent to businesses will be extended by 20 feet. The existing monuments located on the square will be relocated to the north and south sides of the new courthouse.

Construction on the parking garage is expected to last 10 months.

“Hopefully, by August, sometime in there, we’ll be completed with that, but it’s going really well,” Franklin said. “It’s under budget and on time.”

With added square footage comes continued facility use planning, Franklin said.

Almost everyone will visit the courthouse at some point, from jury duty to obtaining a marriage license. Consolidating all court-related departments under one roof will make it easier to conduct business.

“We’ve got some different spaces that we’re looking at trying to figure out how better to serve,” Franklin said. “How we can better serve the public by moving folks and placing them correctly.”

Franklin mentioned court records are housed at the Cotton Belt building several blocks away, but his goal is to find a large, quality location for those records somewhere near or inside the new courthouse.

“We would love for it to be in the downtown campus,” Franklin said. “When people go to the courthouse, and then they go to look at records, we hate to send them away. We’d love them if they could walk and get to it.”

Working together can help enhance accessibility for East Texas veterans, even if it means separating some services. To better cater to the needs of veterans, the Veterans Service Office was moved in 2023 to CampV, a veterans service campus situated at 3212 W. Front St.

“It’s going incredibly. We’ve set new records on people we’re servicing out there just because it’s a one-stop shop,” Franklin said. “That has made a world of difference.”

In addition, the Road and Bridge Department will soon move into a new facility twice as large as the previous one, with ample office space, conference, meeting and training areas, equipment storage and shop areas to serve a growing community.

Coming this summer, following the parking garage completion, properties on the east side of downtown Tyler Square are slated for demolition to make room for the new courthouse.

The last approved event on the square is in late September before construction ramps up. Construction will cause short-term parking issues, but Smith County is finding creative ways to alleviate the stresses, Franklin said.

“We worked with our neighbors, and that was one of our goals, too, with all the traffic issues and all this,” Franklin said. “We know it’s going to be tough. We’re going to do everything we can.”

History

The historical significance of the downtown area must be recognized, Franklin said. Despite demolishing the buildings, history will live on through pictorials, monuments and historical markers.

Sometimes, progress comes with losing landmarks. However, Franklin strives to preserve as much history as possible by relocating historic monuments and commissioning pictorials on the courthouse walls.

“We’re talking about that a lot and just how we can do it and satisfy the majority,” Franklin said.

There are several monuments marking the achievements of early settlers. Texas Historical Commission State Historical Marker and half-mile history markers will be relocated.

Mental health

“Mental health was a big deal. For me, when I was running. I always wanted to push for improving mental health delivery,” Franklin said.

It’s multifaceted but recently Smith County has extended its jail diversion program and added a mental health officer in the jail. There is an ongoing project with the Andrews Center, the local mental health authority, for a jail based competency restoration program.

Franklin said inmates have to wait for state mental health facilities to have available beds before they can receive treatment and be declared competent to stand trial. Many inmates deteriorate in jail, suffering from a mental health condition while waiting for a bed.

The jail diversion program diverts people with mental health issues who have committed crimes into treatment instead of incarceration.

“Some of the folks in the jail were decompensating,” Franklin said. “They were incompetent to stand trial, so we need to get them competent for them and for the system. We don’t need them in our jail going backwards. We want them to move forward with their lives.”

Smith County and the University of Texas Health Science Center at Tyler have also entered into an interlocal agreement to provide healthcare services for inmates.

The benefits of this medical provider include access to local staffing and medical providers from the UT system, purchasing power and discounted rates for medication and materials, a partnership with a regional medical provider and educational institution and access to on-site psychiatrists.

“It will be in person. You can do it on Zoom or you can do it on the phone, but it’s just better if they can be there and see and talk to that person directly,” Franklin said.

There have been up to 50 inmates who were declared incompetent to stand trial at one time, Franklin said. There are many others with significant mental health barriers. These programs are aimed to assist those individuals. Smith County is also working to add 10 crisis beds.

“If law enforcement picks up a nonviolent person, let’s say they pick them up for loitering or criminal trespassing,” Franklin said. “They take them to the emergency room and usually after the emergency room, they take them to the jail and the jail really is not the best place.”

Employees

“Another big goal, and this pertains to our employees as well, is to continue to hire but retain employees,” Franklin said.

Although the county has increased its pay rates with a 5% cost of living raise and implemented strong leadership, there are more than a dozen detention officer position openings in the jail.

Law enforcement makes up the entire legal system, including courts, jails, and probation officers, and consists of 60% of the county budget.

“It’s a big deal. We need to make sure that we’re doing all we can,” Franklin said.

If employees aren’t earning that money, it’s being used as salary savings to cover for overtime, and that’s not what the county wants, Franklin said.

“If they’re having to work overtime, then they’re tired, making it tough on their home life. And so they end up potentially leaving,” Franklin said. “Our goal is to make it where we have all the employees we need, pay them a good living wage, and then keep them.”

People can view career opportunities on the Smith County website at governmentjobs.com/careers/smithcountytx?keywords=.

“The more work we do in the jail with the mental health thing and everything, it’s going to improve the working situation, I believe,” Franklin said.

One of Franklin’s goals for 2023 that he accomplished was hiring a budget officer.

It was a challenge to find someone with accounting experience as well as county, government experience, but Franklin said it was successful. The budget officer will work with department heads to develop the budget and establish measures for saving money.

The officer started in January.

“Most of the time an entity as large as ours ends up saving well over the amount of the cost of a budget officer because they get in there and really dig into the numbers,” Franklin said.

The downtown campus project in Smith County is a significant step toward enhancing service accessibility, preserving history, promoting mental health and retaining employees.

Moreover, Franklin’s vision to preserve the history of the downtown area is a step toward recognizing the area’s historical significance. With the completion of the project, the downtown area will become a hub of activity and a symbol of progress for Smith County.