FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WANE) -- It has been several years since a federal judge ruled that conditions at the current Allen County Jail are unconstitutional. Since then, there have been countless developments in the saga of building a new jail. Currently, that saga is at a bit of a standstill. While Allen County Sheriff Troy Hershberger is trying to keep the current jail's population down, The Allen County Board of Commissioners feels it's ready to break ground on a new jail, which was supposed to happen in late May. Instead, they're at a standstill due to a court case in Indiana Tax Court filed by four citizens who are part of the group dubbed the Allen County Residents Against the Jail. The case is challenging the financing of the jail, particularly a plan by the county to lease the Allen County Courthouse as a funding mechanism. The latest filing from the lawyer representing the four citizens calls the plan "unlawful and invalid." At the Allen County Commissioners meeting on Wednesday, WANE 15 spoke with the board's chief of staff, Chris Cloud. Cloud said the funding mechanism is a complicated process that, on paper, allows the county to use the courthouse to immediately pay interest on the bonds needed to pay for the new jail, rather than letting that interest pile up during the three years it would take to build the new jail. He explained that the county would set up a building corporation, and then lease the courthouse to their own building corporation. Fort Wayne man, woman accused of using fake checks, names to steal vehicles According to Cloud, that keeps control over the courthouse for the county, and -- according to their financers -- would save taxpayers millions of dollars. “If we didn’t have that courthouse option in place, we’d pay 24 million dollars net increase to this project if we didn’t do that. So, what it does, it saves taxpayers 24 million dollars in this project. The courthouse is at no risk whatsoever," he said. "The commissioners would never put such a precious community asset at risk if it was truly a risk. There is no risk involved in this. So, it’s just the mechanism that the state allows us to use and the building that we had available to use.” Cloud added that the courthouse was the only property with a high enough value they could use in conjunction with the interest payments over the three years of construction. They might've used the Coliseum if it weren't already being used in the same way to pay its bonds. When will construction start? The federal judge in the case against Allen County recently filed an order where he shared concern for a long delay due to the Indiana Tax Court case, which he can't do anything about. Cloud knows they're late on when they hoped to break ground, but believes they can move right along once the case with the citizens against the jail is resolved. “Really at this point in time, Allen County is waiting for a resolution in this court case to be able to proceed. If and when it is quickly resolved, we would be able to move forward with the awarding of bids, the procurement of bonds for the project, and move forward rather quickly with construction. I wouldn’t say, though, at this point in time that we are definitely delayed,” Cloud explained. Developer Weigand Construction is doing all it can to keep the process moving, according to Cloud. The county continues to take construction bids and the financing team can move quickly when the time comes to move forward again.