MARK WAITE / PVT Nye County Recorder Byron Foster gives a tour of his spacious new offices. A grand opening will be held to officially inaugurate the new space behind the county complex on East Basin Avenue, designed to provide room for the next decade. Advertisement

The Nye County assessor and recorder employees completed their move into spacious new offices in two modular buildings behind the Nye County Government Complex last week.

The county treasurer followed suit this Tuesday.

Bob Jones, Nye County facilities manager, said it took probably over a year to redo the modular buildings, purchased from Pac Van, to get them ready for occupancy.

County maintenance crews made what Jones calls a lot of cosmetic changes -- putting on a stucco exterior, installing carpeting, putting in new ceiling tile, constructing a wall around the back, installing sidewalks, curbs, building up the foundation and new windows in one building.

The county spent $260,000 to acquire the two buildings. Jones said when all the renovations are included the expansion will cost $650,000.

"It's been a little over a full year we were working on it. It was kind of hit and miss working on them because there was a maintenance crew working on them. There was a lot of times there was no one there," he said.

Jones said Nye County will hire a local contractor to convert the former offices of the assessor, treasurer and recorder in the government complex into two new courtrooms -- one for the second justice of the peace and another district courtroom. Commissioners held a teleconference Thursday to discuss a $1 million request for those improvements.

The move into the modulars has been pretty seamless so far. County Assessor Sandy Musselman said her office was closed for only an hour from 4 to 5 p.m. Friday. Appraisers helped move furniture.

The assessor's office has 12 employees in Pahrump, Musselman said. They will occupy six offices in the new building.

There are four employees in the recorder's office and a fifth is being hired, Recorder Byron Foster said. The recorder's office employees had shared space with the county clerk.

Two employees worked in the treasurer's office in a tiny cubicle across from the justice court window. Asked whether he was happy to leave his small surroundings in the old building, County Treasurer Gary Budahl said, "Very much so."

Foster said he's already begun keeping his office open during the lunch hour. Musselman said she plans to start keeping the assessor's office open over lunch hour in a couple weeks.

The new address for the assessor is 160 Floyd Drive. The recorder occupies Suite 1, the treasurer is in Suite 2.

And the musical chairs aren't over yet.

"We're also getting ready to move the administrative offices down to the space we were renting for the natural resources office. When we do that, we'll move juvenile probation down where administration is now, which will give us some more available office space in the courthouse for the departments that are left there," Jones said.

The Nye County natural resources office is at 401 S. Frontage Road, in a building the county is leasing from Provenza Neth Properties. County administration offices are next to the government complex on East Basin Avenue.

Foster said a public grand opening is being planned for the new annex. He said it is intended to provide for the growth over the next 10 years.

"A lot of people see the room and say, 'Look how much they got' ... In 10 years from now I could have eight people in here. It's hard to say, with the economy the way it is," Foster said.

Eventually, the Calvada Eye building will house a county commission meeting room and administration offices. The county commission already approved up to $100,000 in architectural costs for GM Associates to design an addition onto the Calvada Eye building.