Hoover council to consider land purchase for police training facility
The Hoover City Council today called a special meeting for Thursday to vote on authorizing the mayor to negotiate the purchase of 1.22 acres along Municipal Drive for the construction of a police training facility.
The mayor wants to buy two parcels owned by Jack Nix next to the Extra Space Storage facility on Municipal Drive. The city already owns one half-acre parcel next to Hoover Fire Station No. 4 but would need the other two parcels to build the police training facility, City Administrator Allan Rice said.
City officials have been talking to Nix about the land for months, but today Nix came back to them with a proposal the mayor feels comfortable presenting to the council, Rice said.
Rice would not yet reveal the price being discussed but said it would be released Thursday. The proposal is for the city to pay cash for one of the parcels and for Nix to donate the other parcel to the city and qualify for a tax credit, Rice said.
The land backs up The Place at Galleria apartment complex.
City officials are proposing to build a training facility primarily for use by the Police Department but also available for use by other departments, Rice said. It likely will be 9,000 to 12,000 square feet and include both training space and storage space for specialty police vehicles, he said.
The training portion of the building likely will include one room large enough to accommodate up to 100 people, as well as some mid-size and smaller conference rooms and a room with space for more physical training, such as take downs, pepper spray, tasers and baton use, Rice said. The Police Department had the latter type of room at the Hoover Public Safety Center but lost it in one of the building’s renovation projects, he said.
The City Council already has budgeted $1.5 million for the training facility and expects to get a $250,000 donation from a private donor, for a total price of $1.75 million, but that number is not final, Rice said. Some of the money that would be used would come from revenue the city receives from the federal government for housing federal prisoners at the Hoover City Jail, he said.
The goal is to begin the construction project soon and possibly complete it in 2018, Rice said.
Thursday’s special City Council meeting is scheduled for 3 p.m. in the William J. Billingsley Council Chambers at the Hoover Municipal Center at 100 Municipal Lane. The meeting is open to the public.