by Andrew Alonzo | aalonzo@claremont-courier.com

Claremont City Council voted 4-0 Tuesday to spend $2,892,783 for a new locker room for Claremont Police Department’s female staff.

The new facility — plans for which were approved last year by the city’s architectural and preservation commission — could break ground as soon as October, according to Assistant City Manager Jamie Earl. Once complete, the 1,248-square foot expansion will include “a locker room, showers, bathrooms, a quiet room, hallway, and entry vestibule that will connect internally to the existing police facility,” according to a staff report.

The funds will come from several sources. The bulk, $2,111,990, will come from a portion of the $3,413,471 in proceeds from the recent sale of a city-owned property at 451 W. Arrow Highway to Village Partners Ventures LLC. The remainder will come from $780,793 in American Rescue Plan Act funds. Some $680,000 from the remaining proceeds from the W. Arrow Highway property sale will go the city’s temporary housing stabilization and relocation program, according to Earl. The balance, $621,481, has not yet been assigned.

The contract for the new facility at the police station was awarded to KPRS Construction Services, which is currently building Claremont McKenna College’s new Roberts Campus Sports Bowl.

For decades, the police department’s female staff — seven dispatchers, six sworn officers, four jailers, four records clerks, four aides, one property and evidence clerk, three non-sworn administrative staff, and five community patrol volunteers — has been utilizing a small locker room and a 10-by-20-foot prefabricated modular unit, which the staff report noted “was intended to be a short-term solution.”

“I would just say this has been a long time coming,” Earl said. “It’s been a bit of an inequity in our police department not to have equable facilities for females … I think this is just a huge thing for the city, for the police department and a great accomplishment we’re excited to see finally break ground in, you know, a month’s time.”

“It’s exciting to have this thing that’s been years and years to get to this point finally realized,” CPD Chief Mike Ciszek said after the meeting. “I’m glad to see that we could actually get to that point of where we have equal locker rooms for both male and female staff.”

The staff report noted the city “has earned $541,029 in interest income since the receipt of the $8.7 million awarded by the Federal Government in [American Rescue Plan Act] assistance.” It previously set aside $239,764 for the project.

The council also voted unanimously to approve the appointment of Kathy May to the sustainability committee; and name Vice Mayor Jennifer Stark as the city’s delegate to the League of California Cities’ annual conference, with Council member Ed Reece as the alternate.

Council member Jed Leano was absent from the meeting.