Renovations at Headquarters

The main story on the front page of today’s Kansas City Star does a great job outlining the need for renovations here at 1125 Locust St. Our Homicide Unit and other violent crimes detectives work in unacceptably cramped and outdated conditions. Our dedicated Building Operations staff faces a never-ending task in keeping our HVAC and plumbing systems functioning.

But thanks to you, this is all about to change. By the spring of 2014, Police Headquarters will be fully renovated for the first time since it was built in 1938. The project is funded by the Public Safety Sales Tax, which you, the voters, overwhelmingly renewed in 2010. This will benefit not only the police who work here but also victims and witnesses, as the Star points out:

“No longer will witnesses and victims risk crossing paths with suspects before being interviewed. They won’t be forced to sit for hours in stark waiting rooms either. Architects have designed the layout to shelter victims from the accused and give police private places to take their statements.”

Detectives will be able to work on cases much more effectively and efficiently with this set up, and we hope it will contribute to increased victim and witness cooperation.

We will be adding a community meeting room off the first-floor lobby for public use, as well. And the architect is working to restore much of the building’s original Art Deco grandeur.

You might notice work going on around Headquarters, and we apologize for the inconvenience.

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Construction now underway for new South Patrol and Special Ops divisions

As I told you about last week, we broke ground on Friday on the new South Patrol and Special Operations division staions. It was a great day with lots of Southland community members, elected officials, and officers who are excited to get new facilities.

Below are the remarks I delivered at the event, and some pictures from the day. Keep in mind this project is being paid for by the 1/4-cent public safety sales tax voters passed in 2002. That tax is up for renewal tomorrow. Here are my remarks from that day: 

"Thank you, everyone, for joining us on this crisp morning. I want to especially welcome the elected officials here with us today, the members of the Board of Police Commissioners, staff members of the City Architect’s Office and our Capital Improvements Unit, Hoefer Wysocki Architects and Titan Construction. All of you have played a big part in getting us to this day.

Where we stand today was once the Hart Grove Campground. It was a place of rest and refreshment for pioneers headed west on the three trails that converged here: the Santa Fe, California and Oregon trails. It was a safe haven for those pioneers, and it will be a safe haven once again. The construction of the new South Patrol and Special Operations Division stations will increase police presence and effectiveness both here in the Southland and throughout the city. We believe it will spur development in this area and deter crime.

These facilities are badly needed. The current South Patrol Division was built in 1978 and is not serving the needs of officers or residents. Its roof is leaking, there are inadequate facilities for female officers and community groups, and highway access is poor. Our Special Operations Division is housed in an even worse location – a dilapidated, old warehouse built in the 1930s with horrible leaks and mold that has previously caught fire.

Our officers and the community deserve better. And thanks to the generosity and foresight of Kansas City voters, they will get it. This station is being constructed with money generated from the quarter-cent public safety sales tax that residents approved in 2002. I want to sincerely thank the community for recognizing the importance of public safety. Without you, none of this would be possible."

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Grand opening of new Metro Patrol Division station set for tomorrow

PRESS RELEASE:

Kansas City Police and community leaders will cut the ribbon at 2 p.m. tomorrow to celebrate the opening of the new Metro Patrol Division station at 7601 Prospect Ave.

The ceremony, which is open to the public, will include a tour of the building and remarks from Chief James Corwin, Board of Police Commissioners President Patrick McInerney and Mayor Mark Funkhouser.

The $17 million facility is 28,000 square feet and includes two outbuildings to house KCPD’s specialty vehicles, including Tactical Unit tanks, the Command Post bus and the Bomb and Arson Unit vehicle. The new Metro Patrol Division station replaces the one at 1880 E. 63rd Street, which was built in 1975. At just 10,200 square feet, the old station is in such poor condition that it will be demolished once police have completed their move to the new location.

The new Metro Patrol Division was funded by the Public Safety Sales Tax that voters approved in 2002. It is located on the site of the former Fairyland Amusement Park and will serve more than 97,100 Kansas City residents who live in the Division.

Police will begin operations out of the new station at 9 a.m. Friday, June 18. Residents should continue to use the old 63rd Street station until that time.

New Metro Patrol sneak peek

The new Metro Patrol Division Station at 7601 Prospect will have a grand opening/ribbon cutting at 2 p.m. Wednesday, June 16. The public is invited to attend to check out the new facility. But I wanted to give you a sneak peek. The art piece that is part of the City's 1% for Art project was recently installed outside the main entrance, and it's looking pretty sharp.

New Metro Patrol station garners praise

The Kansas City Star's Steve Penn wrote a great column today about our new Metro Patrol Division. The station is at 77th and Prospect (the site of the old Fairyland Park amusement park) and is set to open in May. It's a vast improvement over the current station on 63rd Street, and we can't wait to put it to good use for the city. Be sure also to check out the photo gallery to see what the new station looks like. Information about the station's grand-opening ceremony should be coming soon.

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Check out progess on the new Metro Patrol Station

Despite the bad weather, construction on our new Metro Patrol Division station is coming right along. The above picture was taken on Monday, and you can watch the daily construction progress by webcam, too. (Though from Dec. 24 to 26, the camera was mostly covered with snow.) The webcam site also has archived pictures, so you can see how far the building has come.

At last week's Board of Police Commissioners Meeting, Eric Bosch, director of the City's Capital Improvements Management Office, reported the new station is completely walled in and heated. Work is under way right now on interior things like plumbing, wiring and drywall. The anticipated opening date for the new station is summer 2010.

The new Metro Patrol Division station is located on the site of the old Fairy Land Park near 75th and Prospect. Its construction is funded by the quarter-cent Public Safety Capital Improvements Sales Tax that Kansas City voters approved in 2002. The new site and building will allow police to respond to citizens' needs more quickly and provide a more workable space for officers.

Send comments to kcpdchiefblog@kcpd.org.

South KC will be home to new police hub

Another article from our latest Informant newsletter discusses plans for a new police complex in the southern part of the city. To see more pictures, go to http://www.kcpd.org/ and scroll down to the bottom where it says "Watch our progress":

Twenty-five acres of land at Bannister Road and Marion Park Drive in South Kansas City will soon be home to multiple police operations and buildings.

The site will be home to the new South Patrol Division, but it also will house the new Special Operations Division, a new helicopter hangar, a multipurpose building, and possibly a property and evidence warehouse and a new, division-level building like a Crime Lab.

Major Jerry Gallagher, commander of the Facilities Management Division, said there were several reasons to put so many buildings on one site.

“One is the converging interstate system provides ready access,” he said. “And two, it’s just the opportunity of economies of scale. We can do more for less.”

The new South Patrol Division, Special Operations Division and multipurpose structures are being funded through the current quarter-cent public safety sales tax. That tax will sunset in 2011. The construction of another division-level building and property and evidence warehouse depends on whether voters choose to renew the tax.

Capital Improvements is moving forward with a design that would combine the South Patrol Division and Special Operations Division into one building. Major Gallagher said cost wasn’t the only factor in the decision to put the two together.

“The security of that police omnipresence will allow us to locate additional police facilities there in the future,” he said.

The multipurpose building would offer a place for department personnel to get physically fit with a full gym and aerobics and weight rooms.

“We’ve got great workout facilities at the Academy up north, and we wanted to offer something similar down south,” Officer Rhonda Schulte said.

But it will be much more than that. It will contain a briefing room for the Special Operations Division. A full-size basketball court will be designed with sliding doors to become part of the briefing room. The gym even could be a temporary shelter for residents in the event of a disaster.

The multipurpose building also will house the Bomb and Arson Unit, Canine Section, Retirement Office and be a satellite location for the Kansas City Police Credit Union. And it’s being designed to accommodate the mass dispensing of vaccines in the event of a pandemic.

Officers with KCPD’s Capital Improvements Unit met several times the past few months with architects, civil engineers, landscape architects and leaders of the City’s Capital Improvements Management Office to brainstorm the best layout of buildings on the triangular site. They’ve settled on a site plan that would have the SPD/SOD building facing the multipurpose building on a looped roadway. The helicopter hanger would be on an offshoot to the south. The site plan includes a Crime Lab and Property and Evidence warehouse on the loop, too, with parking in the middle.

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