BEAVERCREEK — Beavercreek officials are looking into upgrades for the city’s police building.
“We’ve maxed out every inch of this building,” police chief Dennis Evers said of the department’s current 11,900-square-foot facility on Research Park Drive. “There’s just no room to expand or grow.”
According to Evers, several building deficiencies are driving the initial considerations. A largely unused space near the building’s entrance; a witness interview area in the facility’s lobby, which affords little privacy; lack of space in the building’s roll call room and men’s locker room; and an unsecured outdoor parking area for the department’s vehicles, are areas where upgrades are needed “in the not-too-distant future,” according to the chief of police.
He also noted that when assessors from the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies recently conducted an on-site inspection, they noted “several issues” with the building, including security concerns and that the building’s holding area was inadequate for segregating detainees by age and gender.
City officials are in the process of choosing a firm to conduct a feasibility study, which would help to determine what upgrades could be made and how expensive they would be.
Evers noted that while a new police building “may” come out of the discussions, he said, “This is by no means an attempt to get a new building.”
“I just want to know, is it feasible to do anything in this building?” Evers said. “If it is, then what can we address as far as the deficiencies we’ve identified and potentially, what’s the cost associated with that? That’s the first step.”
Evers said the department moved into its current building in 1997.
“To be honest with you, we outgrew it the day we moved into it,” he said. “We have squeezed everything out of the space we have in here.”
“We’ve maxed out every inch of this building,” Beavercreek Police Chief Dennis Evers said of the department’s current 11,900-square-foot facility on Research Park Drive. “There’s just no room to expand or grow.”