Vernon Hills police back in renovated headquarters

The teal-colored trim at the Vernon Hills police headquarters has been replaced with shades of gray, but that's far down the list of changes in what essentially is a new home.

After about eight months of construction, officers and administrators within the last week moved back to an upgraded and reconfigured facility at 754 Lakeview Parkway. The move is so fresh the walls are bare of pictures, flags and other accoutrements, projecting a rather sterile look for the moment.

“We have absolutely no focal points in this building yet,” Chief Mark Fleischhauer said Monday.

That's a minor detail for the $3.8 million project that spans two buildings. The administrative building at 754 Lakeview Parkway is where the bulk of the work was done, but improvements also were made across the parking lot at 740 Lakeview Parkway, which houses the dispatch center and is where the public can make reports or conduct other business.

For the past several months, about 60 department employees have been sharing space in the 740 building and at last are back home. A dedication is set for 10 a.m. Saturday.

“It's a complete renovation. All new HVAC (air conditioning and heat), roof, security/video, electric — basically, it's a whole new building,” said Mike Atkinson, the village's building commissioner.

Interior walls have been moved, ceilings dropped and other changes made to convert what was described as an outdated and underused building to better suit police purposes.

The usable space within the same building footprint has grown from about 18,000 square feet to 26,000 square feet, Fleischhauer said.

“The flow was changed considerably,” he said. The wedge-shaped headquarters was built in 1992.

Besides the administrative offices, improvements were made to locker rooms, specialty areas with work stations for officers and command staff, an investigations division, evidence processing, storage, jail and prisoner handling area, gun range and a lunchroom. Improving facilities for female employees was another priority.

Fleischhauer said the old air conditioning system would fail often enough that most everybody knew how to get onto the roof to reset the unit.

At one point, plastic garbage bags were funneled into garbage cans to catch water from the leaky roof.

Locker facilities and a remote access were created at the neighboring building, which was purchased by the village in 2006. How to best use the two buildings has been under consideration for nearly 10 years.