COURTHOUSE PLANS GET BOOST IN PRIORITY.

Byline: Charles F. Bostwick Staff Writer

With construction starting on a $74.6 million municipal courthouse in Chatsworth, the way is open for work to begin a year from now on the long-delayed Antelope Valley courthouse.

State law gives a Chatsworth courthouse priority over one in Antelope Valley, where construction is scheduled to start in August 2000 at a site on Avenue M near 6th Street West, county officials said Tuesday.

``State legislation made up a list of courthouse priorities. When one gets knocked off the list - when one courthouse gets completed - everything moves up,'' said Jean Huston, justice deputy to Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich. ``It moves the Antelope Valley courthouse one step closer.''

Work started Aug. 10 on the site near Winnetka Avenue and Prairie Street where a Chatsworth courthouse will be built, and a ceremonial groundbreaking there is scheduled for Thursday.

In Lancaster, a new courthouse is expected to cost $69.9 million, a county Public Works Department spokeswoman said Wednesday.

It is planned as a four-story, 370,000-square-feet building - about three times the size of a Wal-Mart store - with 15 courtrooms and space for as many as six more.

Architects hired by MBK Real Estate Ltd., the developer on the project, are still drawing up the design and construction documents. The tentative schedule allows time for the permits and review process.

``We're still on target to begin construction in August 2000,'' said Public Works Department spokeswoman Jean Granucci. She said the tentative timetable calls for the new courthouse to be finished around November 2002.

Last year state Chief Justice Ronald George called the Lancaster courthouse, built in the 1960s, one of the most crowded he has seen. For more than 10 years, many public officials have said Los Angeles County government needs to replace it, but the county fiscal crisis early in the 1990s stalled planning.

Even 1-1/2 years ago, county officials were saying construction would not start until 2012.

A 1998 state audit, requested by Assemblyman George Runner, R-Lancaster, faulted officials for mismanaging courthouse construction projects across Los Angeles County. The audit said the county spent more than $18 million on plans and land for courthouses likely never to be built in North Hollywood, West Los Angeles, the South Bay, Santa Monica and Pasadena.

The audit also faulted the county for its handling of the Lancaster project.

For example, the auditors said, county officials should have been able to purchase schematic, design and construction documents for a $6.6 million contract. Instead, county officials spent the entire amount for schematic and design plans and expected to spend an additional $5.2 million for the construction documents, the report stated.

Runner said he was pleased that the Chatsworth construction has started.

``It certainly is good to remove at least one of the hurdles everybody pointed to as to why our courthouse hasn't been constructed,'' Runner said. ``We feel we have accomplished what we intended. Now we just need to see that continues.''

While waiting for the new courthouse, court officials have used some makeshift quarters. The former sheriff's station in Lancaster was remodeled to hold juvenile hearings. Palmdale city government is building a temporary courtroom downtown for civil cases.