The Sarnia Police Service Board (SPSB) has selected an architectural firm to start the design of its new headquarters.
During a special virtual meeting on Friday, the $41,850 tender was awarded to Ventin Group Architects Ltd.
In a report, Chief Derek Davis said construction of a police facility requires specialized experience to meet the needs of modern policing.
He said this initial phase will not include detailed drawings.
"We need to do an architectural needs assessment, we need to get an actual estimate of the cost from a professional design firm and it helps us get more specifics," Davis said. "We're trying to do this economically and incrementally, so we're not jumping into a waterfall type of full project from start to finish. We don't have architectural expertise inside the police service."
The Toronto based firm has designed multiple Ontario police facilities, including sites in St. Thomas, Walkerton, and Wellington County.
Davis said the firm came highly recommended by St. Thomas and Brantford police services.
"What we know we need is the experience of a firm that's built Ontario facilities in recent history, that understands current standards, that can help us take all of those lessons learned into any kind of project that we do going forward," he said.
The Sarnia Police Service allocated $500,000 in its 2025 budget to start the process of building a new facility.
"When we contract an architect to do the full design it's going to be significantly more in terms of cost, but at this point it's to get a high level conceptual design to move us forward in the process," said Chair Paul Wiersma.
The police service will test out the architect and, if satisfied, approval for addition step(s) in the architectural process would be obtained.
It is estimated the total cost of architectural design and engineering documents with the final plans made ready for a general contractor tender could cost between $1million to $1.5 million or six per cent of the total project cost.
Board Member Chrissy McRoberts highly recommended hiring the architect.
"If we follow the trajectory this is a good choice. Is it a huge price tag? Absolutely it is, but it's not all happening this year," she said. "We need to initiate this to move forward with what the requirements are."
The anticipated need for a new headquarters has been discussed for many years. In 2020 former Chief Norm Hansen said it was time to start putting money away for a new building.
"It's at the point where we have to have a plan to move forward because this issue grows every day, every hour, it's not going anywhere," said current Chief Davis.
McRoberts noted the new headquarters won't just benefit the police service.
"We're going to build another asset for the city. We're investing in our own police force, so that they can do a better job, be better trained," she said. "It's an investment in projections of what's happening with the world right now."
The police board submitted an expression of interest for the procurement of city-owned land around the research park to build the new police facility.
City council will consider that request on Tuesday, April 29.