The $84.5 million Fulton County Justice Center is an interconnected complex of three buildings located in downtown Atlanta, GA, which when finished will represent almost one million square feet of courts, chambers and related operations. The project opened up an opportunity for entrepreneurial project manager Dorothy Clark Harris, a well-known Atlanta interior designer who served as in-house project manager on the blockbuster Coca-Cola headquarters in the 1980s. Harris is on the joint venture team (with CRSS Constructors and AMC Mechanical Contractors) awarded the responsibility of building a new 10-story court building (completed in 1993), and the renovation of the existing 1912 Beaux Arts courthouse (completed in 1995), and its contiguous 1960's addition, currently underway.

Harris has apparently won the respect of her male colleagues for the way she handles this traditionally male-dominated position. Jim Pounds, Jr., overall manager of the project for the Fulton County Building Authority, praises her as a "dedicated, detailed team player and an exceptionally outstanding problem solver." Getting things done on time and saving money for the client are two of Harris' strong virtues. She also has a talent for negotiation and through a year's diligent research and canvassing, managed to outfit 85 percent of the justice center offices with donated or heavily discounted surplussed office systems furniture. The equipment came from neighborhood corporations downsizing their office operations.

"These companies preferred to de-acquisition furniture rather than warehouse it," said Harris. "The bottom line is that the inventory yielded approximately 600 work stations." Seventy percent of the furniture represented 20 years of various generations of the Knoll Stephens systems. The balanced represented Steelcase Valencia. Harris says this kind of retrofitting is not without its headaches, "but if one has patience and ingenuity, the cost savings are so beneficial that the headaches go away."

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