A large, three-story structure in Allegheny West where college students used to learn how to paint and sculpt would become the Pittsburgh Bureau of Police's temporary training facility under a bill given tentative approval by City Council this week.
If the bill becomes law after a final vote Tuesday, the city would pay the Community College of Allegheny County as much as $2.1 million to rent its former visual arts building for police training over the next three to six years.
City Clerk Mary-Beth Doheny said the only member of council to vote against the bill was Councilwoman Theresa Kail-Smith.
The current police training facility in Highland Park, which city officials argue has too little floor space and is prone to flooding, would still house the bureau’s firing range.
Other police academy programs, though, including emergency scenario training and driving and firearms simulations, would move into the 32,000-square-foot CCAC building.
Police Chief Cameron McLay has blamed a lack of space at the Highland Park facility for small bureau graduating fewer officers than he'd like. The last class to be trained at that facility graduated in late June; two new recruit classes are slated to begin at the Allegheny West facility in September and December of this year.
McLay said he's working to improve the force's diversity after the city agreed to pay a settlement of $985,000 plus court costs to eligible black police academy applicants who were not issued job offers between 2008 and 2014.
In 2014, the most recent year in which data is available, the city's police force employed 856 total employees. Retirements brought that number to 803 by 2015's end, according to the Fraternal Order of Police Fort Pitt Lodge No. 1. Another 175 officers are eligible to retire this year.
City leaders plan to spend $241,000 to renovate the CCAC building this summer.
After paying about $1 million to rent the building for the first three years, City Council would have to vote to renew the lease each year afterward with a cap at six years total. By then, city leaders said they hope to have built a new, more permanent police training academy.
