Symphony Towers Courtrooms Hit Right Note With Justices

The state appeal court’s San Diego branch has swapped its old downtown office for two floors in the Symphony Towers high-rise, and the new digs are very much uptown.

Consider the mahogany bookcases. More than a mile--5,283 feet--of mahogany bookcases.

If a particular book isn’t in one of those bookcases, maybe it’s in the dumbwaiter. Or in one of the eight justices’ private bathrooms. Or perhaps computerized research in the library would be the way to go, anyway.

Then there’s the state-of-the-art security system, the one with the infrared motion sensors.

And the art collection. Fifteen pieces in the halls, all very modern. One is entitled “Innocent.�

Very swank. But, as the justices prepare for oral argument today, their first hearings in the new quarters, there’s just barely order in the court.

Not Everything Fits

The San Diego branch of the 4th District Court of Appeal, the state’s busiest intermediate appellate district, issued no opinions from June 27 until this past Monday because the move disrupted its computer system, said Stephen M. Kelly, the court clerk.

The copier doesn’t fit in the copy room. It’s 18 inches too long with the collator attached, Kelly said.

And all that mahogany in the courtroom should be nicely complemented at today’s hearings by the rental chairs.

“Some of them look like they could still have syrup from Denny’s on them,� Kelly said Thursday. “They’re that type of chair. But they’ll look OK.�

Even if, as Kelly said, “It will be a year before I can find anything,� the consensus is that the justices and their 45 or 50 staffers will gladly suffer any inconvenience at their new home. They simply had outgrown their old space on the sixth floor of the state building a few blocks away.

When Kelly joined the staff in 1978 the court numbered about 15 employees, including three judges. Now there are roughly 55 employees, Kelly said, and there are eight judges, including three added last October.

Even without the three additions, the district was the most productive of the state’s Courts of Appeal last year, according to records from the state’s Administrative Office of the Courts in San Francisco.

Although death-penalty appeals go directly from Superior Court to the California Supreme Court, other appeals, as a general rule, proceed to a Court of Appeal. From July 1, 1987, through June 30, 1988, the most recent period for which figures were available, the 4th District processed 9,831 “business transactions,� meaning everything from written opinions to orders of every sort, said Mike Kramer, a spokesman for the records office in San Francisco.

More Growth Seen

The 1st District, the Northern California branch that includes San Francisco and Alameda counties, was the runner-up among the state’s five other districts, with 9,374 transactions, Kramer said Thursday.

The 4th District--which includes San Diego, Imperial, Inyo, Riverside, San Bernardino and Orange counties--is split into three divisions. The San Diego division, which handles cases from San Diego and Imperial counties, is the busiest of the three, Kelly said.

For instance, from July, 1987, through June, 1988, the San Diego division issued 755 written opinions, Kelly said, 45% of the district’s total of 1,667.

“As the district includes the fastest-growing counties in the state, Orange County and San Diego and Riverside, as you look into the last years of this century and the first part of next century, this district is going to continue to grow and this court along with it,� said Justice Daniel J. Kremer, presiding judge in San Diego.

Realizing 18 months ago that the court was outgrowing its 18,000 square feet at the state building, where it had been since the building opened in 1963--and factoring in the asbestos problem that made growth at that site problematic--the justices decided to cast about for new chambers, Kelly said.

Though the court looked at buildings in Mission Valley and in the Golden Triangle area near La Jolla, the justices decided it was important to stay downtown, Kremer said.

“We consider that we are an important part of San Diego’s legal and court community,� he said. “The principal number of trial courts are right here, downtown. We decided it was important to be near those courts and near the firms and the lawyers that practice at those courts.�

There also was the lunch issue. Federal judges open their lunchroom at their downtown chambers to appellate and certain other state judges, Kremer said. The state judges have to pay for meals just like the federal judges, but they didn’t want to lose ready access to that privilege, he said.

“Especially in appellate courts, there is an isolation that comes with the position,� he said.

Enter the under-construction Symphony Towers. The building offered 33,136 square feet on two contiguous floor and room for 10 judges, just what the court wanted, Kelly said.

The building, meanwhile, wanted someone on the fourth and fifth floors who wouldn’t be disturbed that the wall on both floors abutting Symphony Hall has no windows, said Craig Millen, the building’s marketing director. It turned out the courtroom could take up the bulk of that space on one floor and the library on another, Millen said.

Special Improvements

Snagging the court also meant the building might be able to fill other floors with law firms with heavy appellate calendars, or those who enjoy the “prestige� of the court, Millen said.

“The nature of the Court of Appeal would not ensure other law firms coming here,� Millen said. “But certain law firms would certainly look at Symphony Towers because the Court of Appeal was here.�

To seduce the court, the building put up $1.98 million in special improvements, said Lane Richmond, Southern California area supervisor for the real estate office of the state’s general services office.

The largest chunk of that money, $629,000, went for all the mahogany, Richmond said. The shelves in the bookcases had to be built with a special reinforcing lip after court clerks determined that the average row of fat law books weighs 93 pounds, Kelly said.

Some of the other money went to the security system, $75,000, and the dumbwaiter, $17,000, to lug records and books between floors since there is no internal stairway, Richmond said.

Although the building put the $1.98 million up now, the court--that is, taxpayers--will be paying that money back in monthly rent, Richmond said. The check each month for the first three years of the 10-year lease is $70,791, Kremer said. The court has an option for another 10 years, by the end of which--the year 2009--monthly rent will be $173,366, he said.

“Probably will be a bargain by then,� Kremer said. “I suspect it will be.�

At the state building, the court was paying about $200,000 a year to general services for rent, Kelly said.

“We take the cheapest deal we can get in a building that works in an area that works,� said Richmond, who negotiated the lease. “That’s true in this case and in all deals we do.�

As for the art, that’s just a bonus. The 15 pieces--all by local residents, except for one by a San Francisco artist--don’t belong to the taxpayers but rather to Knightsbridge Associates, the partnership that owns the building, Millen said. It bought the 15 pieces to hang in the halls, in public areas, in hopes of appreciation, both psychic and financial, and retains the right to sell any or all of the paintings, Millen said.

When the real courtroom seats arrive--they have a special backing, and are on order--things will finally start feeling like normal, Kelly said.

Then there will just be the cockroach problem. The old space was overrun with cockroaches, so many that exterminators fumigated even the inside of the microwave oven in the staff lunch room before the move, Kelly said.

“They figured they killed maybe 80% of them in the material that went into the (moving) boxes,� he said. “So they’re going to have to spray again to try to get the other 20%. I now know why you move once every 26 years. It’s always something.�