A site near the construction for the new Huntsville city hall has perhaps emerged as the favorite for a new home to the Madison County Courthouse.

The city council at Thursday’s meeting will consider a feasibility study for “potential government service building site” for the site at 312 Fountain Circle, which is currently the city’s Inspection Department as well as home for the Madison County Emergency Management Agency. City operations occupy much of the building and will largely move to the new city hall once it opens next year, essentially rendering the city inspection building obsolete.

The Madison County Commission is considering sites for a new courthouse, though it has not elaborated on details about the plan. Former Madison County Commission Chair Dale Strong, before resigning to take office as north Alabama’s congressman, first floated the idea of a new courthouse during his annual “state of the county” speech. The commission has said it will work with city officials to help determine a site for a new courthouse.

Strong’s replacement as commission chair, Mac McCutcheon, said in a recent interview with The Lede that it was “premature to talk location” for a new courthouse and that the project needs more study before moving forward.

Though the county commission owns the land where the current courthouse stands in the middle of the town square, Huntsville Mayor Tommy Battle has said he would like to see the site become a park once a new courthouse is built and the current one is taken down.

The council will consider a contract for $22,500 for the feasibility study to be conducted by Chapman Sisson Architects. Services of the contract will include “customary civil, mechanical and electrical engineering design services and architectural services.”

The 0.69-acre site is at the southwest end of Fountain Circle at Williams Avenue about a block east of the Huntsville Museum of Art. The site has an appraised value of $604,500, according to county tax records.

A new courthouse would be smaller the current eight-floor building. In 2021, the Madison County Service Center opened on North Memorial Parkway at Oakwood Avenue – shifting voter registration, license department, probate judge and offices for sales tax, tax assessor and tax collector out of the overcrowded downtown courthouse.

The new courthouse would largely be a facility for judicial activities such as district and circuit courts and the district attorney’s office as well as the county commission.