City Council Hears Plans for Stillwater Police Department Expansion

When the fire department relocates from its downtown station to the new Armory site in 2015, the Stillwater Police Department hopes the council will consider a plan to expand the law enforcement center, too.

The Stillwater City Council on Tuesday night heard a $1.95 million proposal (PDF of the presentation attached) to expand the Stillwater Police Department into the current fire station space.

“The current law enforcement center is less than desirable with some significant deficiencies,” Police Chief John Gannaway told the council on Tuesday. “We have been working with Wold Architects, and have a plan in place that will correct all the deficiencies. Our staff will be safe, our community members who come to us can do so in a private setting with this plan, and our evidence can be collected, processed and stored in a professional, secure matter.”

That plan comes in to the tune of $1.95 million, and would expand the current 9,100 square-foot facility to about 21,000 square feet.

“The amazing thing about this plan is there is no wasted space,” Gannaway said. “There are no luxuries. There’s no million-dollar bathtubs or anything crazy like that. Our entire department is very, very happy with this plan.”

Joel Dunning of Wold Architects presented the plan to the council and said he has joined members of the Stillwater Police Department on tours of the Inver Grove Heights and Cottage Grove police stations to get a feel for modern trends, and understand the overall objectives of a new facility.

The proposal hopes to create a better police department identity at City Hall, and provide a secure, more efficient space for Stillwater police officers and staff members to work in, Dunning said. The proposed renovation adds staff and public parking spaces, a better evidence storage area, public and private interaction spaces, and an expanded garage, work space and forensics lab.

Predicted population growth should not be a driver of this project as Stillwater’s population is expected to remain relatively the same for the next 20 years, Dunning said. It should be done to meet the operational needs of the police department.

“They have not asked for the world,” Dunning said. “They asked for something practical, and it happens to match up really well with the space that is available.”

If the proposal moves forward, the design process could start at the end of 2014, with public bidding happening in summer of 2015 and a possible move-in date of 2016, Dunning said.

The first phase of the project would be to remodel the basement of City Hall with locker rooms. The second phase would be to fill in the space between the current fire and police departments. The final two phases of the project would be to remodel the fire and police departments.

The council did not vote on the proposal.

“I hadn’t walked through the police department in a couple of years,” Stillwater Mayor Ken Harycki said, “It was eye-opening to see the conditions. The officers are working on top of each other. It is very tight.”

Councilmember Tom Weidner said the current conditions are “alarming” given the importance of officer and staff safety.

“Securing the area is extremely important,” he said.

Councilmember Ted Kozlowski said the lack of privacy when residents walk into the current police department to make a report was the most compelling argument for a new space.

When someone walks into the department to make a report, there is one common hallway with a couple of chairs there, Gannaway said.

“If someone comes in reporting a fairly serious crime they are asked to take a seat at the desk or a chair — in an unsecured common hallway — while an officer is called in,” he said. “What happens is while that person is waiting to make the report, the assailant walks in the door for whatever reason and all of a sudden you have both sides of a dispute in the same area.

“We’ve had some pretty significant issues because of that public hallway,” Gannaway continued. “And some fairly serious incidents because you’ve had people meet who shouldn’t have.”

The conversation about the lack of space in the police department has been going on for a couple of years, Harycki said, it makes sense to address all the issues at once.

If the proposal moves forward, Gannaway said there would be some room to expand, but nothing significant.

“We can refigure this in the future to fill our needs,” the chief said. “But what we have now is basically people working out of closets.”