After nearly five years of construction, the City of Reno is celebrating the completion of their new Public Safety Center.
This is a 108,000 square foot building that formerly housed the Reno Gazette Journal and has now been transformed into a state-of-the-art headquarters for the Reno Police Department.
Although a lot of remodeling has been done, the project still kept a lot of the building's original structure, preserving its historical significance and reducing environmental impact throughout construction.
"Using this facility, we're going to have a lot of our officers in one space and able to deploy more universally because we're going to have parking, more ease of transportation, being where we're at it's very easy,"Â said Reno Police Chief Kathryn Nance.
The Public Safety Center is located right in the heart of downtown Reno, allowing officers to respond to emergencies faster in the area.
It also helps them provide more outreach to the community.
The new building also accommodates the growing police force, technology, and tools they need such as being equipped with back-up generators, and solar energy systems.
Even the foundation of the building was raised to better withstand any possible natural disasters.
"Right now, in-person services are really challenging because of parking, because of privacy, because of where you can go to take these reports," said Nance. "When you come here, you're going to have a full-service police department that you have access to. You want to speak to a detective? We have quiet family rooms where people can go and feel comfortable. They're not hard interview rooms."
Some members of the Reno Police Department have already made themselves comfortable in the new building.
The rest of the department will slowly move in throughout September and October. Until that happens because of safety concerns they ask the public to continue to go to the old police station on East Second Street.
