New Police Headquarters Ahead Of Schedule, Under Budget

Twin Cities Police Chief Todd Cusimano offers a tour of the new police headquarters on Doherty Drive in Larkspur. The project is expected to be completed by December ... and under budget!

Imagining the worst that can happen — floods, fires, earthquakes — the Twin Cities Police are taking action now to prepare.

Grant money is being used to ground high-speed communication cables if the telephone and wifi towers go down in an earthquake. All the patrol cars are being equipped with Internet capability. And most notably, The Twin Cities Police are getting a new home.

"This is what you need to have a police department," Police Chief Todd Cusimano said. "Compared to the old building, it wasn't a police department, it wasn't a building. That was a temporary facility that was built to be a library in 1973."

The two-story building next to Hall Middle School on Doherty Drive in Larkspur still needs some finishing touches, but planners from Kitchell CEM say the project is ahead of schedule and should come in under budget. The new station is expected to open in December, three months early.

The designs for the new Twin Cities Police station might look elaborate, but Cusimano is certain there isn't an inch of wasted space.

The station includes a community/meeting room, sleeping quarters for officers coming off long shifts, a state-of-the art communications center, holding cells and evidence processing areas.

"A lot of it is storage space. It's locker space, it's a community room, it's emergency preparedness areas and then offices for the employees we have," Cusimano said. "There's nothing extra here."

When designers were initially drawing up plans for the new station 16 years ago, they looked to Memphis, a major metropolitan area where police have developed leading techniques in disaster preparedness.

Piper Park Lane will be closed June 20-Aug. 19 while crews install new sanitary and water lines, widen and repave the road and install sidewalks and street lights.