Commissioner Darryl Fairchild voted against the property purchase after asking for more time to consider it.
“Not passing this could jeopardize this deal,” said Major Paul Saunders of the Dayton Police Department.
‘Our downtown is safe’
Officer staffing levels are based on calls for service, said Saunders, but they staff the downtown more for visibility rather than on calls for service.
“Our downtown is safe,” Saunders said to Dayton city commissioners on Wednesday.
If Dayton Police staffed officers downtown based on calls for service, there would hardly be any in the downtown, Saunders said.
“We understand that the downtown is our economic engine. It drives our revenue and small crime downtown could have such a major negative economic impact that we have to preserve it,” Saunders said.
The Dayton Police Department divides the city into three patrol zones, and downtown is part of the Central Business District. Right now there is no traditional police station in downtown; the Central Business District’s headquarters is at 248 Salem Ave., in northwest Dayton.
The Public Safety Building is on West Third Street downtown, but it serves as Dayton Police’s administrative headquarters, not a patrol district police station.
The proposed site of the downtown station is about a block from the Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority’s downtown transit center and the Levitt Pavilion Dayton.
For years, downtown Dayton has been statistically safer than many other areas of the city, according to Dayton crime statistics, but the bus hub has become a hot spot.
Violence that has occurred near the bus hub and Levitt Pavilion include a drive-by shooting in 2023 and the fatal shooting of Dunbar High School student Alfred Hale earlier this month.
Mixed reactions
Crime, violence and disruptive activities around the downtown bus hub have been issues for years. Business leaders urged city commissioners to pursue a downtown police station, saying security has reached a critical point.
“We have a downtown issue today, and it must be addressed immediately through swift action and leadership,” said Chris Kershner, president and CEO of the Dayton Area Chamber of Commerce. “We do not have the luxury of waiting.”
The Downtown Dayton Partnership was also in support of a police station downtown.
“This really can’t wait. This is an urgent of desire of the entire downtown community,” said Steve Stanley, interim director of the Downtown Dayton Partnership, speaking on behalf of companies like Stratacache, Windsor Companies and CareSource.
The Vex/Diner and the power house properties are a few blocks from the Oregon District.
Nikki Stargel, vice president of the Oregon District Business Association, recently told city commissioners the entertainment district could use a more robust police presence so it feels more secure.
While business leaders showed strong support for the proposed downtown police station, city residents appeared more skeptical.
“Not that I am against a police station necessarily downtown, but the city owns multiple sites downtown already that would be a suitable site for a police station,” said Evan Lavoie, of Dayton.
“...This, to me, would be negligent use of taxpayer money,” he said.
Spending $1.4 million for the downtown property appears like the city prioritizing the downtown over neighborhoods, said resident Mary Sue Gmeiner.
“I’m not convinced that we need a new station downtown,” Gmeiner said.
The new police station would be a top-down approach to addressing safety concerns, she said, rather than addressing the root causes of violence.
The Vex nightclub building is about 5,600 square feet, and the power house building is nearly 40,000 square feet in size, say documents on the LoopNet real estate listings website.
The Dayton Police Department also is building a new station in West Dayton at the Wright brothers factory airplane site, along West Third Street.
The city hasn’t built a new police station in more than three decades. The last station it constructed is at 248 Salem Ave., which houses the Central Business District patrol district.
