A new facility incorporating some police and fire department services could be coming to Northeast Chatham.
With the Children’s Treatment Centre moving to a new facility in the fall, Chatham-Kent Council has asked administration to draft a report on the redevelopment of the current building on Lark Street into a centralized Community Safety Centre.
Council voted 13-3 in favour of the proposal, with councillors Alysson Storey, Michael Bondy and Amy Finn as the no votes.
Staff has been instructed to retain a consultant to create a site plan and concept/preliminary design for the building to house several fire and police department services. This would include administrative fire offices, the Emergency Communications Centre, investigative services, mobile crisis unit, paramedicine services, and a dedicated Emergency Operations Centre. Victim Services and the Chatham-Kent collision reporting centre would also be housed at this location.
“We’ve reached capacity at our headquarters, so we’ve been talking with fire, EMS and the city for some time about looking for space,” said Police Chief Kirk Earley. “When the Children’s Treatment Centre came up, I [thought] it was an ideal spot.”
Administration told council that using an existing municipally-owned building reduces the need for additional standalone facilities and removes the need for an existing leased building, which is currently used as the back-up Emergency Communications Centre.
The report on the site plan expected to return to council for approval in September.
