Evansville police prepare to move downtown
EVANSVILLE — City police hope to move downtown into the old fire station before summer.
The police station at 535 E. Main St. is up for sale, and City Administrator Dan Wietecha said he's meeting with three interested parties. The building is about 1,400 square feet and was appraised in January 2007 at $178,000.
The city last year bought the old fire station at 10 W. Church St. from Evansville Fire District. The plan is to remodel it for the police department.
The fire department moved last week into a new station on Water Street.
"I'm anxious. I can't wait to get moved, but I'm not in any big rush," Police Chief Scott McElroy said. "I want to do it right, take our time and do it right, because we do have our normal obligations at the same time."
McElroy and several officers visited other police departments for layout ideas, and McElroy said he's finalizing remodeling plans.
The plans will need state approval and permits before the job is put out for bid. McElroy said he hopes local contractors do the work.
The new home will add office space, a conference room—a feature the department now lacks—more room for evidence and indoor vehicle and equipment storage.
One of the biggest benefits, both McElroy and Wietecha said, will be having the police department back downtown, next to City Hall.
"It's just somewhere where it's going to fit in better," Wietecha said.
Police are preparing for the move by digitizing boxes of paper records.
"We've been scanning like crazy and digitizing all our records, and all of our records are being recycled," McElroy said.
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Jan 25, 2009 at 9:59 a.m.
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CC......you will never get the 3 safety departments in Evill on the same page. If a tiny village like Brooklyn can get a new firehouse "taj mahal" you know Evill will be following right behind.(and they are)
Its ironic that that the city has rezoned the area west of the "old" firestation to commerical/business. Maybe if they had been patient, those properties could be bought and a new centralized public safety building could have been built.
This would house the Fire, EMT and Police....wait that would make sense and actually save the taxpayers of Evill, Union and Magnolia towns lots of money. We certainly CAN'T have that. It would take away the glory that the F.D. so desperately craves.
Brooklyn has/is getting an new/upgraded sewer plant, Evill follows. If you want to see whats coming next in Evill drive thru Brooklyn. If you need a preview of next years Evill tax bill, stop there too!
Its good to see the Police finally geting a place that they deserve/can actually use.
Will the EMT's move into the old Stoughton Trailers building next?? It should be large enough.
Jan 23, 2009 at 5:33 p.m.
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Maybe they will have a better attitude if they don't have to go so far to work. It seems like this is just wasteful, and they just did not want to be left out of getting something.
Jan 23, 2009 at 1:56 p.m.
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Does anyone else remember when they were in the city hall building and thought they just 'had' to get out of there as well. They wanted to be closer to the east side as at the time it was growing. Now they want to be more down town again, as the westside has grown as much as the east side. Ridiculous. As far as embarrassing where they are now. they chose it, thought it was good enough at the time. What a waste of money the city had and will spend with this. Really what may have been best is to put the E.M.S. and Police and Fire all in the same building. It may have cost more at first but they would have been set for years and years.. They will be lucky if they can sell that building at all that they are in now.
Jan 23, 2009 at 1:40 p.m.
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Closer to the "relaking" project.
Jan 23, 2009 at 9:14 a.m.
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Its about time they get out of that trailer! What an embarrassment to the city! Very unprofessional!
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