BY WALT SCHAEFER
The Cincinnati Enquirer
NORWOOD -- This city needs a new police headquarters and jail.
That, said Safety Director Paul Bazzano, comes as no surprise because facilities now in the back of City Hall have endured since 1914.
But "the consultants, Phillips Swager Associates, national specialists in jail and police facilities, told us this is the worst facility they have seen in the country," Mr. Bazzano said.
The city is poised to study the findings and ask voters to finance a $3.2 million to $4 million, two-story facility on Montgomery Road just south of City Hall. The consultants recommended Norwood raze the building and connect a new jail and headquarters to the rear of City Hall.
Police Chief Timothy Brown said a "'modern facility is essential to Norwood citizen safety."
The present police space is so small, interviews are conducted in a corridor. There is but one entrance to the station, and prisoners have to be brought through police offices to the jail -- often past witnesses and victims waiting to give statements, Chief Brown said.
And prisoners walk through public areas to mayor's court in the City Hall council chambers.
Mayor Joe Hochbein said his administration has launched law enforcement initiatives such as a drug enforcement unit, a crackdown on vandalism, bicycle patrols and property maintenance enforcement.
"To give teeth to that effort and law enforcement in general, we need a full-service jail and new police facility," he said.
To build it, the city will need voters to approve a bond issue next year, perhaps on the May ballot, city officials said.
Preliminary estimates indicate a 1.95-mill, 10-year bond issue would generate the needed $400,000 a year and finance the two-story, 22,995-square-foot jail and police facility recommended by the consultants, along with $100,000 for improvements to the telephone system at City Hall, Mr. Bazzano said. The city paid Phillips Swager Associates $9,000 to complete a needs assessment. It will take about two years to complete the project.
The new facility would provide 16 adult and two juvenile cells and meet state jail standards to hold prisoners for 30 days or longer. Because of its condition and security concerns, the state permits police to hold prisoners for only eight hours in the existing jail before requiring transfer to the county's downtown justice center, officials said.
The state of the jail concerns police and other city officials. Mr. Bazzano called it "an accident waiting to happen" and a "liability concern."
The jail was closed in October 1995 because of safety concerns. It reopened as an eight-hour holding facility in April 1996 after three cells were lined with a shatterproof plastic to alleviate concern over cell design and ventilation.
