Top Elmhurst Officials Focus On Police Station

ELMHURST, IL – An Elmhurst committee plans to look into ways to pay for a new police station, a project that would cost tens of millions of dollars.

Mayor Scott Levin and City Administrator Jim Grabowski recently asked the City Council's finance committee to examine the issue and report back.

The current 34-year-old station at 125 E. First St. is far smaller than those in other towns when measuring square footage per officer, according to the city.

Officials have criticized how their predecessors from the 1980s approached building a new police station.

"I don't want to repeat the mistake made in 1988 – make a budget and try to make it work. This is Elmhurst. Our police department is very important," Levin said at a meeting in February. "We need to come into this century."

At the February meeting, an architect presented police station alternatives to the council's public safety committee. Building anew on the same site, the architect said, would cost about $47 million.

In recent months, some officials have compared the police station to another costly proposed project, a new train station. They have suggested that a police station may be more important.

The architect, Raymond Lee, listed problems with the current building, particularly security. For instance, inmate transfers involve many swinging doors, which is "just really not safe," Lee said.

The finance committee plans to review the issue at its meeting at 7 p.m. Monday at City Hall.