Union Police Department is opening its doors to the community to allow residents the chance to tour the new police station and help celebrate the department’s move.
The open house, which is set for 4-6 p.m. Friday, will be the first time Union PD has hosted an event at police headquarters since moving to the new location on Front Street earlier this month. Chief Billy Pat Walker said residents will have the opportunity to tour the building, examining the place their local police officers and dispatcher work every day.
A lot of work has gone into relocating the police station from its former home next to City Hall on Main Street, Walker said, and residents deserve the chance to see what their friends and neighbors accomplished.
At the old police station, officers shared a single desk, and dispatchers were packed into a small reception area in the front. The small refrigerator and microwave were located inside the office, barring dispatcher and officers from taking lunch or grabbing a snack while a suspect was being interrogated.
“It was kind of embarrassing when you come into junk,” Walker said previously.
The new station, however, has three offices, enough for each officer on a shift to have their own. Dispatchers are behind a locked door with a window, providing them with additional security throughout the day and night shifts. Additionally, city employees converted a small closet into a kitchenette, giving officers and dispatchers round-the-clock access to the food and drinks they need to keep going throughout their shifts.
Union Police Station is manned 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, Walker explained. Officers and dispatchers work nights, weekends and holidays to keep residents safe and respond when they’re needed. They deserve a working space they can take pride in, he said.
However, relocating the police station was not just for the officers. Walker said it was also for Union’s residents, who deserve to have a clean, professional-looking police headquarters in their town.
“It wasn’t just for me. It was for everybody,” he said previously, “Workers and the citizens of Union.”
Union is not a large town and financing large projects such as a police station isn’t easy, Walker said; however, the city employees, Board of Aldermen and members of the community came together to remodel the empty Front Street building and meet the police department’s need.
He said he hoped everyone in the community would take time to come out to the open house, help celebrate the new station and see what was done with the taxpayer’s money.
