MONTGOMERY — Legislators still have work left to do to find funding for completing the move into the new State House currently being built, according to State Sen. Greg Albritton (R-Range).
Members of the Legislative Council approved contracting with the RSA in September 2023 to design and build a new State House.
The project costs would be reimbursed to the RSA by the state, with an 8% administrative fee added. The state could either buy the property from the RSA after its completion or enter into a 25-year lease agreement that eventually would also make the state the property owner.
The new State House will be located behind the old one. The old State House will eventually be demolished and replaced with a green space area.
The current State House opened in 1963 as the Alabama Highway Department Building. It housed the Alabama Department of Transportation, then known as the Alabama State Highway Department, until 1985, when the Alabama Legislature moved in.
The building of the new State House is expected to cost $296 million and be completed at the beginning of 2027 for the next quadrennium.
"We've got some issues that we've got to deal with. State house funding, that's going to be a major, major issue. The increases that we've had all across the board with all the agencies and how we're going to continue to meet those demands. The biggest contributor to the General Fund is the interest we're earning from monies we've been holding in the bank. That includes federal money, state money, ARPA money, all of that. We're still holding a large sum of cash because we're paying as we get things accomplished. All of that money is going to dry up in about 18 months or so. We're going to try to get as much as that out as possible as early as possible to get it all finished out so we don't get it clawed back. However, that's going to put us in about another year or so when the funds are going to be out and the interest rates are going to be low and therefore our biggest contributor to the General Fund is going to be dry. That's going to be a significant issue," Albritton, the Senate General Fund budget committee chairman, told reporters on Thursday.
Albritton said he was concerned about where money would come from to fund demolishing the current State House.
"My concern is as I pointed out in the committee meeting I think it was (Wednesday) where we're discussing getting the building built. RSA is doing that and then we're going to do a lease I think through that but when we start to move over there, this building, this structure is going to be torn down and we dealt with a bill (Wednesday) for getting the authorization to take this (current State House) down, that's going to cost money. That's going to cost a lot of money. We have set aside some monies in the budget that's come up from the House that's stashed in the conditional which is 'If we have money left over at the end of the year, then we'll pay that money if it's left over.' So, we don't really have the money," Albritton said. "It's not just the new State House. It's the taking down of this (current State House). It's the parking deck that has to be done, the new technology that is going to be going in there, and what other material matters are we going to need? We're not going to be able to take everything from here and just shift it over. It won't fit for one thing. The other is it doesn't meet technology requirements so there's going to be a lot of costs involved in that that are not in the cost of the building."
There are nine days left in the 2025 legislative session.
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