Police Headquarters

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Oswego Headquarters Nighttime Panoramic

After 30 years of police officers sharing space at the old Village Hall building on Main Street, the Village of Oswego built a new police station on Route 34 in 1991. At the time, the new headquarters was designed to accommodate approximately 50 employees.  Almost another 30 years sped by and that threshold had been surpassed by 20 employees.  Currently, the Oswego Police Department employs 70 full and part-time employees along with numerous volunteer auxiliaries, including police explorers and citizen police academy association alumni. Personnel numbers have been projected to reach 170 by the year 2040.

Due to the rapid growth of the county, the existing police station caused significant design limitations and caused the police to outgrow their facility, resulting in the decision to build a new police station. The Village originally conducted a space needs assessment in 2008 for a new police facility. Due to the economic downturn at that time however, discussions were placed on hold. The topic of a new police facility was again presented to the Village Board in 2014 and after about a year of discussing the proposed upgrade, the Village rehired the same consulting firm, McClaren, Wilson & Lawrie of Wheaton (MWL), in 2015 to update the previous space needs assessment as well as assist in budget projections and evaluate site locations for a new police facility. The firm, which specializes in public safety facilities, has done similar planning for several agencies in Illinois, including Aurora, North Aurora, Montgomery and Sugar Grove. In addition to signing on MWL, the board approved contracts with Hellmuth, Obata & Kassabaum, Inc. (HOK) to serve as their design engineers on the project as well as with Gilbane Building Company as the construction management company. 

After surveying four sites, a 16 acre lot, located off of Woolley Road, was purchased by the Village for $205,000. The new policy facility is located adjacent to Oswego Fire Protection District Station 1 on Woolley Road and is intended to be a public safety campus with areas that will be available for public use as well.  60-percent of the project’s budget was funded by non-Oswego residents through sales taxes. 

The Oswego Police Headquarters, now on the east-central side of the village is 68,200 square feet, three times the size of the old police station. It completes the village's Public Safety Campus with Oswego Fire Protection District Station 1 immediately west of the police facility. The building symbolizes the open engagement and dialogue between law enforcement officers and the citizens they protect and serve that police everywhere strive for. The building includes a central tower built with solar panels facing south to primarily heat the lobby through radiant heat flooring. The headquarters was designed for LEED Silver certification through features such as its orientation to maximize energy efficiency and its use of daylight to illuminate interior spaces. Other features include automated lighting controls, a high-efficiency HVAC system and low-flow plumbing fixtures. In addition, to support efforts to foster collaboration with other law enforcement and first responder agencies, the building design incorporates a variety of training features such as a tactical indoor firing range, defensive tactics training room and a flexible training classroom that can be converted to an emergency operations center. A glass-enclosed community room is also available for educational programs and other events.