Evans Police Department designs new station just south of current complex ...Saudi Arabia

Evans police long ago outgrew the 9,500-square-foot building they now occupy.

Chief Rick Brandt estimates the building — which predates current administration and is connected to the Evans Community Complex — was designed for a little over 20 officers and a handful of civilian support staff.

Now, when fully staffed, the department employs 47 officers and civilian staff.

“We’re tight,” Brandt said. “We have no more lockers. Our training room is full. We’ve outgrown this building significantly.”

Later this year, Evans is set to break ground on a new building spanning more than three times their current space. At over 30,000 square feet, everybody will finally have a chance to spread out.

On Oct. 6, the city paid $1.7 million for a 5-acre lot just south of the community complex, 1100 37th St. Evans plans to break ground on the new station sometime in the second half of 2025. From there, construction is estimated to take about 2 1/2 years.

“If I was a betting man,” Brandt said. “I’d tell you to look at maybe the first quarter of 2027.”

The current space the department is working in is essentially one long hallway with a bit of open space and a few offices on either side. The evidence “room” looks like a kitchen — minus a sink and refrigerator — from a college house up 11th Avenue.

“We don’t have any kind of holding cell or locking anything,” Brandt said.

The current space also carries a bit of a safety risk for everyone involved.

“If you think about if from just a security perspective, officers that make an arrest park in the back open lot — there’s no fencing,” Brandt said. “Then they take the suspect and walk them to the back door, and the officer is distracted opening the back door.

“Then you bring them into this facility and we have no place to lock them up. So if they decide they want to leave, all they have to do is jump up and run out the back door, right? The new station will prevent all of that.”

Though the new building is still in the early stages of design, it will have everything Evans police need to do their jobs — in large part because the department is taking a very hands-on approach with the design.

“Who knows what they need better than them?” Mayor Mark Clark said. “These are the individuals that are training at the facility. They’re working day in and day out at the facility. They know what their needs and wants are.”

Brandt said Clark has been “good to his word,” keeping the department closely involved with the plans for the new building.

The department has members of each division — including patrol, investigations, civilians and records — giving input and figuring out whatever obstacles may arise.

Though Brandt won’t be captaining the ship when the building is completed — as he’s slated to retire later this month — he’s already identified one of his favorite parts of the new station. It’s staying close to the community complex, maintaining the “campus feel” was important.

In the existing space, working in the same building as other city staff has allowed Brandt to forge relationships and create a deeper sense of serving the community.

“It keeps us close to the city because in a smaller community like this, relationships are built across the hall,” Brandt said. “We work with public works. We work with streets — and to maintain that connectivity, I think it’s going to be very important to the officers and the rest of the staff.”

Clark added that the central location will also maintain the level of convenience Evans already tries to offer its residents.

“The community doesn’t have to go to two separate places,” Clark said. “They can go to city hall and take care of whatever business they may have there, then go to the police department.”

One of Clark’s favorite details of the new station is how the city is making it happen.

Evans anticipates going into between $25 million and $30 million of debt to make the new station a reality. That means roughly $1.5 million to $1.7 million yearly for a 30-year term, depending on the interest rate the city secures at closing — which is expected in late April or early May.

But they’re able to leverage the city’s food tax to avoid raising existing taxes or implementing any new taxes.

The city is putting down about $5 million from the food tax fund as a down payment. Then using the income expected from the food tax moving forward as a form of collateral, the city can, in theory, fund the project fully without any changes to residents’ taxes.

“No hit on anybody’s property taxes,” Clark said. “Everything is strictly through the food tax.”

Evans chose FCI Constructors as the general constructor for the new building. They have the experience — having built the new Windsor police station which opened last year — and they’ve pledged to use local subcontractors whenever possible.

Not only does local contractors securing bids keep more money in the city, but it also gives them a sense of pride that they’re contributing to such a vital part of their community.

“We have people that reside in Evans that work in Evans that are going to be building a huge, significant project in Evans,” Clark said. “We’re really excited about that.”

Both FCI and the city have clarified, however, that it is a bid process, and there’s no guarantee local contractors will end up being chosen.

Ultimately, the new station — much like everything the city proposes — is being built with a couple of main goals in mind.

First and foremost, it allows Evans police to better do their jobs, which should only lead to a safer city.

“Everything is about increasing and enhancing our public safety capacity and efficiency,” Brandt said. “And when you’re in a facility that’s inefficient and you don’t have everything you need, it changes our ability to be efficient as a department and provide public safety services.”

The fact that the city’s largest, most grandiose project in decades will sit just off U.S. 85 for everyone passing through to see also isn’t lost on city officials.

“I want to make Evans the community of choice in Northern Colorado,” Clark said. “We want to make sure that this is a place that when people come to live here, they want to stay here. This is about community beautification and community pride. And this is one way of showing what Evans can be and what Evans will be in the future.”

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