Michelle Manchir, TribLocal reporter

The Bolingbrook Police Department’s headquarters will have doubled in size by the time renovations two years in the making are complete by the end of this month.

The $12 million project will update the department’s station, at 375 W. Briarcliff Road, so it’s a better fit for the 113-member police force, said Lt. Mike Rompa, spokesman for the department.

Detectives will have individual offices for the first time, each officer will have his or her own locker, and the department will no longer be “bursting at the seams,” Rompa said.

Some of its additions – like easier access for the public to the jail to bond people out – are aimed at making things easier for the residents, too.

Here are some of the highlights of the project:

Evidence storage

The amount of evidence – things like stolen TVs and drugs police collect from crime scenes and criminals – outgrew the evidence storage room police originally had at the station. The department at one point had to rent public storage lockers for some items safe-keeping, but the new evidence storage room nearly triples the space it had before, Rompa said.

Jail

The face-lift includes five new cells in Bolingbrook’s jail – making a total of 12 from its previous seven, said Lt. Dave Schurr, who helped organize the construction project.

The extra space was needed because the village sometimes must hold prisoners longer than a few days because of overcrowding at the Will County Jail, Rompa said.  A new entryway for the jail will also allow people who need to bond someone out to do it directly with an officer, rather than go through the department’s front desk to do it.

“We were thinking ‘how can we make it easier for people?’” Rompa said about construction design.

911 Center

The department’s previous 911 dispatch center featured old equipment and Rompa said it was becoming more difficult to locate parts for it. 

Bolingbrook joined the Will County Emergency Telephone System Board, a move that also brought in up-to-date equipment and software.

“The technology is so much more intense now,” Rompa said.

The move also means should the village ever lose 911 services in a natural disaster, calls can be outsourced to a nearby village for fast assistance.

Weight room and break roof

The remodeled station includes a couple accommodations for officers – a new weight conditioning room with a treadmill and dumb bells for officers’ use, and an outdoor place to eat lunch and take breaks on a portion of the roof.

Schurr said the weight room is especially appreciated by the officers.

“It was basically a closet,” he said of the station’s previous gym. “For us personally that’s the highlight.”

mmanchir@tribune.com