N. Aurora looking at what new police station will need

A week after buying the land it needs for a new police station, North Aurora moved the project further along by discussing what the facility will need and setting up a committee of trustees to help guide the process.

James McClaren of McClaren Wilson and Lawrie Inc., which specializes in police facilities, met with the board Monday to help decide just how much space the department will need as the village grows. McClaren formulated a space-needs study for the village earlier this year.

McClaren said the village should house its police department in two buildings, a large main station and a smaller out-building for evidence storage and a shooting range.

McClaren's study calls for the main building to be about 24,000 square feet and the outbuilding to be about 5,000 square feet, both larger than the current station on State Street. Trustees and police officials seemed to accept the findings.

The new buildings at the northwest corner of Route 31 and Airport Road are scheduled to be complete in 2010 and will be designed to last 50 years.

"Our police department does a great job and this has been needed for quite a while," Trustee Bob Strusz said.

Strusz, along with trustees Mark Gaffino and Mike Herlihy, will sit on a committee to shepherd the project over the next two years. They will select an architect next year as well as look at a bond issuance next summer, Herlihy said.

Although in favor of the project recommendations, trustees asked if a shooting range was necessary. The 4,000-square-foot range would help keep the village's officers fully trained and be more efficient, police Chief Tom Fetzer said. Officers now use several ranges throughout the area.

Since January of last year, police officers have spent 213 hours of travel time to those facilities, which along with range fees has cost the village a total of about $6,700, Fetzer said. He added that one of those facilities -- the Kane County sheriff's -- will soon be closing.

"Once Kane County closes down, we don't know what we're going to do," Fetzer said.

He added that because private ranges do not allow for shooters to move, they do not provide realistic police training.

"It would be kind of foolish to build the station without the range. I'm definitely in favor of it," Gaffino said.