Another remodeling project is about to get under way on the Flathead County Courthouse campus.

On Wednesday, county commissioners awarded a $162,000 contract to Swank Enterprises of Kalispell.

The construction effort, which focuses solely on the county attorney’s office, is expected to take three or four months, county Administrator Mike Pence said. Swank submitted the lowest of five bids for the project.

Last week, commissioners awarded a $2,003 contract for data and communications system cabling work to Digital Communication Systems Inc. of Kalispell as part of the remodeling project.

Five attorney’s office employees have been temporarily relocated for the duration of the construction work, Pence said. Three attorneys who work in the office’s civil division and two assistants are temporarily working on the third floor of the Earl Bennett Building.

The project became necessary because the space allocated to the county attorney’s office on the second floor of the Flathead County Justice Center has become too small for the department, Pence said.

The county attorney’s office moved into its current area in either 1986 or 1987. At the time, there were five attorneys on the staff. Today there are nine attorneys plus support staff.

When the office moved into the justice center from the two annexes, “it was thought the space would be sufficient for far into the future,” County Attorney Ed Corrigan said. “No one expected the economic boom or the recession” that Flathead County has since experienced.

Prior to the construction of the justice center, the criminal attorneys worked from the east annex and the civil department was housed in the west annex.

Corrigan said without gaining some additional space, he probably would have had to split his staff into different work areas on the courthouse campus. He didn’t like that option much, so he and Vicky Eggum, the county attorney’s office administrator, met with Pence to talk about options.

After reviewing the floor plan of the building, county officials determined that some of the hallway, the exterior waiting area and one separated room at the attorney’s office could be incorporated into the attorney’s office to resolve the space issue, he said.

In addition, office spaces will be reconfigured to move storage areas and the copy room to the west side of the office suite, Corrigan said.

Files will be consolidated into rolling file cabinets that can accommodate more paperwork in less space.

New paint and flooring will be installed as part of the project.

The county attorney’s current budget includes money to hire another attorney and another support staff position, Corrigan said. That expansion is necessary because a fourth District Court judge now works in Flathead County.

Corrigan expects to hire the two new people in June, after the remodeling work is completed.

An additional judge changes the work flow of the county attorney’s office, Corrigan said. More cases are active at once with one more judge.

Typically, District Court clerks schedule about 25 trials for each two-week jury term. However, as many as 45 cases can be scheduled in any given term, he said.

With a fourth judge, now there is a jury term every month because each judge has three jury terms per year, Corrigan said.

Attorneys in his office typically spend about two months before each jury term preparing for scheduled trials, conducting pretrial conferences and meetings.

The county attorney’s office also has attorneys handling cases in justice court nearly every day, Corrigan said.

The six criminal attorneys in his office were assigned to 1,801 cases in 2011, down from 2,084 in 2010.

In 2009, the county attorney’s office handled 2,255 criminal cases; in 2008, the office handled 2,151 criminal cases.

Reporter Shelley Ridenour may be reached at 758-4439 or sridenour@dailyinterlake.com.