It was all smiles Friday between Fire Chief Martin Senterfitt, Chief Judge Donald Moran and other city officials exclaiming two words:

“It passed!”

A 14 hour day of testing the smoke system at the new Duval County Courthouse resulted in a passing grade- Senterfitt says a pass with “flying colors.”

“It was painful because we wanted to say it was right, and now I can comfortably say it’s right,” says Senterfitt.

The building has now been given a temporary certificate of occupancy while some final small tests take place on “punch list items”.These are small final fixes that Senterfitt says are normal steps.

And as those steps are underway, the employees of the new courthouse will be settling in to the building as early as Monday.

“We’re really excited about the opportunity to get our employees in there and get their things unpacked and set up,” says Chief Judge Donald Moran.

The courthouse won’t actually open to the public until the week of teh 18th.The old courthouse is still on schedule to open this Monday to begin working through the backlog that has built with the courts out of operation for 3 weeks.

“For probably a 20 to 30 day period we will have a backlog and then I think things will hit a normal pace,” says Judge Lance Day.

He says the backlog is especially apparent in criminal cases.

Day says the old courthouse will be open at least through Wednesday, although that may be reassessed as the move in to the new courthouse progresses.

Another discussion to watch progress will be the one between the city and Turner Construction.Senterfitt says Turner was vital in getting the building up to code and earning a pass on this final test.We know the General Counsel is investigating exactly what Turner will owe in terms of potential fines for the opening delay.In a comment emailed Friday, Turner told us they will hold to the terms of their contract with the city.

Day says there is a time capsule ceremony in the works for the new building, although planning the details for that have taken a back seat to getting the courthouse open.