Land is cleared for new Sussex Family Court

The demolition of six buildings in downtown Georgetown to make way for the new Sussex County Family Court is complete. Construction is now ready to get underway at the corner of Market and Race streets.

The $115 million, 107,800-square-foot facility will replace an outdated 30,000-square-foot Family Court built in 1988 about a block away on The Circle.

The new facility will have more courtrooms – eight as opposed to the current six – and those courtrooms will be more than twice the size of the existing courtrooms: from 1,400 to 1,800 square feet in the new building versus an average of 600 square feet in the existing courthouse. The additional courtrooms will allow Family Court to better handle the volume of cases in Sussex County, which has nearly doubled since the existing Family Court courthouse opened in 1988.

The complex will also have additional space for the Department of Justice, Office of Defense Services, Office of the Child Advocate and other court system partners. A 300-car parking garage is also planned.