The city manager in Merritt says renovations are on the way for the local courthouse.

Scott Hildebrand says the province will be funding those renovations, which city staff learned about during a meeting at the Union on B.C. Municipalities convention last week with Attorney General David Eby.

“I think the courthouse has been on the (UBCM) agenda since 2017, from what I’ve seen in previous notes. There’s just some maintenance issues, issues with security cameras, security in general, and just the general shape of the building that we went in asking for. And to our surprise they had a plan in place that this work will be done in this fiscal year.”

Hildebrand says the province hasn’t given a cost nor a timeline yet for the work, but says it is expected to be finished before the end of the fiscal year, which is March of 2020.

He says the long-term goal will be to get a new courthouse but says upgrades will do justice for now.