Unalaska, AK – In two weeks, the Unalaska Trial Court is moving into a new building downtown.

The new space at 204 West Broadway is across the street from the current 205 West Broadway offices. Court Clerk Jane Pearson said the new building offers a number of advantages over the old one.

"There's a larger lobby area, the courtroom itself is bigger, the jury deliberation room is bigger," she said. "Plus we have two new attorney conference rooms, which we don't have here."

For now, attorneys who want to meet with their clients privately during trials have to either step out in the hallway or outside the building.

Henning Construction started bringing in pieces of the new courthouse by barge early last month. The new building will be named after Chief Alexei Yachmanoff, an Unangan leader in Unalaska at the turn of the last century who has a personal connection to the courthouse property: the downtown lot belonged to Chief Alexei's daughter, 84-year-old Pauline Casey, who now lives in California. Casey sold it to Monica Henning, who is leasing it to the state and hopes to put up a sign on the property honoring the local leader.

Magistrate Dawson Williams said he's not going to miss one feature of the current courtroom: a pole in the middle of the room which often blocks his view of defendants.

"Particularly during arraignments, the defendant [has to look] around this pole to see the court--which makes it a little more interesting, but it can be a distraction," he said.

The court will conduct its last day of work at the old offices on March 27, and will open for business across the street on April 1. Pearson said she's planning an open house for the public to see the new space.