Finding county offices

By Clarice McKenney

Last week, I needed the services of several county offices. I found that several are no longer located in the Boundary County Courthouse. So I asked Boundary County Court Bailiff Ben Reinhardt for directions. When I returned to his desk after locating everything, I thanked him and he asked me to help spread the word.

In the past, I had found the services available in each office and the location of each pretty confusing. The new physical location and arrangement of offices makes more sense to me, though, and everything is actually easier to find.

In the “good old days,” most Boundary County Government offices were housed in and around the Boundary County Courthouse, 6452 Kootenai Street, right across from what once was downtown Bonners Ferry’s grocery store (more on that soon). It consists of three stories, and is still the seat of county government.

If you enter by the Kootenai Street entrance, you go up a short set of stairs, through the front doors onto a landing. If you go up, you’ll be on the main floor, where you’ll find Ben’s desk.

When he’s not upstairs in court, he’ll be on the main floor, answering questions, maintaining courthouse security and decorum and welcoming county citizens to their house … and in a few days he’ll be helping people tie Christmas wishes for Care -n- Share on the boughs of the County Christmas Tree he likely played a hand in trimming!

Ben’s desk, by the way, is where all things jury duty happen in Boundary County. He can be reached via email at bcjury@boundarycountyid.org or by calling the clerk’s district court office at (208) 267-5504.

Take a left and the county commissioners’ office will be on your left. Commissioners Wally Cossairt, District 1, Tim Bertling, District 2m and Ben Robertson. District 3, are usually in session from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mondays and Tuesdays. To be included on their agenda, call commission clerk Stephanie Sims, there from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, at (208) 267-7723 or by email, commissioners@boundarycountyid.org.

Coming out of commission chambers and looking left, you’ll see the office of treasurer Jennifer Economu. Open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, this is where county property taxes are paid. To learn more, visit the treasurer’s web page  or call (208) 267-3291 or email boundarytreasurer@boundarycountyid.org.

Continuing around, what once was the assessor’s office is currently empty but not for long; clerk/auditor/recorder Glenda Poston’s increasingly cramped office will soon be spreading out, with court administrators moving into the vacated space. Once the move is made, that’s where you’ll go to file court documents, pay tickets and fines and conduct any business you might have with Idaho’s Boundary County First Judicial District Court, Magistrate Judge Justin Julian and/or District Judge Lamont Berecz.

Go up the staircase to the third floor and you’ll find Boundary County’s two courtrooms and ancillary offices. For information, call (208) 267-5504.

Go back down to the main floor, turn left and you’re in the clerk Glenda Poston’s office, which currently includes court administration. In addition to tasks already covered, the clerk’s office is where you go for passports and marriage licenses, to register and vote, to have important papers and legal documents such as mortgages, deeds and DD214s officially recorded and much more. If you have county business to attend and don’t know which office to turn to, start at the clerk’s office — if they don’t do it, they’ll know who does.

To learn more, call (208) 267-2242 or email gposton@boundarycountyid.org.

And that brings us back to the old Akin’s Harvest Foods sprawling and long empty one-floor building with its easy accessibility and large parking lot. The Boundary County Courthouse is a dual rarity.

Built in 1941 as a project by the Works Progress Administration to put people to work and break the grip of the Great Depression, the $100,000 structure, its three chiseled panels representing this place’s predominant industries; farming,logging and mining. Unfortunately, it isn’t easily accessible by the injured or handicapped …and it is one of very few public buildings not handicap-accessible as required by the Americans with Disabilities Act passed in 1990.

That’s because, in 1987, the Boundary County Courthouse was added to the National Register of Historical Places … and so cannot be altered in a way that would detract from the building’s historic character. A ramp was built to go over the three interior steps to provide wheelchair access to the basement, but no higher. There is no place within to accommodate an internal elevator. An external elevator was proposed but rejected because it would alter and detract from the building’s historic character.

The county’s acquisition of the old Harvest Foods building (as well as other changes to be described) will provide access to county public offices as required by ADA, and according to Poston, planning has been underway to relocate all courtrooms and court offices under one ADA-compliant roof within the next year or two.

Returning to what is now, go back down the stairs to the main entrance, but instead of exiting, take either staircase down to the basement, and in wintery or wet weather, be overly cautious … the steps are unforgiving.

Safely down and once again circling the floor clockwise, you have the public defender’s meeting room and next to it the now vacant mapper’s office. Across the hall was the Department of Motor Vehicles office, part of the assessor’s office, and not to be confused with driver’s licensing, which falls under the aegis of the sheriff’s office … but I digress … that office is currently empty but will soon give room for Boundary County Prosecutor Andrakay Pluid to expand into, with Victim Services getting its own space.

To reach the prosecutors office, call (208) 267-7545 or email prosecutor@boundarycountyid.org.

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To the east of the courthouse is the Boundary County Sheriff’s Office, housing the jail, the dispatch center and the sheriff’s personal office. Public access is limited to the entry vestibule unless accompanied by authorized personnel. To reach the Sheriff’s Office, call (208) 267-3151 or, if an emergency, 911.

Now let’s stroll down the sidewalk on First Street on the east side of the Sheriff’s Office, take a right on Railroad Street and walkdown to the building that once housed the University of Idaho Extension Office, Boundary Volunteer Ambulance and the county maintenance shop.

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The Assessor’s Office is now in Suite A and the Idaho Transportation Department Boundary County Department of Motor Vehicles is in Suite B, open from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday except holidays. They can be reached at (208) 267-7613 or autolicense@boundarycountyid.org.

The Assessor’s Office, which includes the appraisers and mappers, is the office responsible for appraising all property, real and personal, subject to Idaho property taxes. Assessor Olivia Drake can be reached at (208) 267-3301 or boundaryassessor@boundarycountyid.org.

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Article6791 B Main Street, home of the Boundary County Extension Office.And for a road trip south on Highway 95 to 6791 B Main Street between Far North Outfitters and Mountain Springs Church, now home of the Boundary County Extension Office, where you can find almost any answer regarding Boundary County, sign up for a range of interesting and informative classes and volunteer to help out with the Boundary County Fair or with one of the several county 4-H Clubs. To learn more, call (208) 267-3235 or email
boundary@uidaho.edu.

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And now to the old Bonners Ferry National Guard Armory, 6566 Main Street. now the Boundary County Annex, where you take your teens to take their first driver’s test and hopefully earn that rite of passage, their first drivers license! To enter, use the parking lot side door. They can be reached at (208) 267-3151, Extension 204 or bscodriverslic@boundarysheriff.org.

Also in the annex is county probation and parole, accessed from the front door, (208) 267-7983.

(Driver’s Licensing office, 6566 Main St. is on the parking lot side of the old armory, and Probation is on the Main Street side.)

Driver’s licensing moved from the Sheriff’s office quite awhile ago and is in the former National Guard Armory building on the highway (Main St.) on the south hill. For newcomers to our county, that’s on the north side of Highway 95 across from the Boundary County Middle School.

Whether you’re an old timer, like me, or a new resident, I expect your experience with county offices to be like mine. They’re all manned by friendly, competent staff members who try to make necessary visits easier on residents.