Hoover police break ground on $4.2 million training center
Hoover police and city officials today broke ground for a $4.2 million police training facility next to Hoover Fire Station No. 4 on Municipal Drive.
The 16,000-square-foot facility will include an advanced firearms training simulator, defensive tactics training room, classroom space and storage space for specialty police vehicles such as the incident command center and armored rescue vehicle.
Police hope to have it built and open in about nine months, Chief Nick Derzis said. It will be the first time in the city’s 51-year history that the Police Department has had a facility dedicated for training, Derzis said.
Police had been using the gym at the former Berry Middle School on Columbiana Road for defensive tactics training but had to find other space since the school board sold that school to the Vestavia Hills Board of Education, Derzis said.
The advanced firearms simulator features multi-directional sound and video-based scenarios that allow threats to be engaged across multiple screens, the chief said.
“It’s some of the best training I’ve ever seen,” Derzis said. “This stuff gets your heart palpitating. It’s a heck of a system.”
The U.S. Marshal’s Service has been using this system for some time, he said. Hoover police plan to make it available for use by other local, state and federal law enforcement agencies as well, he said.
Representatives from the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration, U.S. Marshal’s Service, Alabaster Police Department and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were present this morning at the groundbreaking.
“Our personnel are the most valuable assets we have, and we want to make sure they can have the very best training available,” Derzis said. “We’re excited to be able to provide it for them.”
The Hoover Police Department has always had a good training budget, but this facility will enable the department to consolidate its training and add state-of-the-art technology, he said. “This project has been over three years in planning. We’re finally seeing it come to fruition.”
The facility is being named after Frank and Pam Barefield. Derzis said Frank Barefield, chairman of the board for Crime Stoppers of Metro Alabama, has been a longtime supporter of the Hoover Police Department and is contributing $250,000 toward the training center.
Barefield said he’s honored to be involved with one of the best police departments and police chiefs around.
Hoover Mayor Frank Brocato said Hoover was built on public safety.
“Every administration before mine, that was extremely important,” he said. “That tradition of that support is carried on all the way through this administration as well. We’re proud to have this new training facility. It will really be state of the art for our police officers, who we want to have the best training around.”
This training facility will provide an opportunity to take the Hoover Police Department to the next level, Brocato said.
“We’ve always prided ourselves on being cutting-edge,” he said. “I think this absolutely will be a tool in our toolbox that will help us accomplish that.”
Duncan and Thompson Construction agreed to take on the construction job for $3.28 million, and the total cost, including site work, is about $4.2 million, City Administrator Allan Rice has said.