New Lovell police building dedicated

​The new Lovell Police Department building was officially dedicated on January 9 at noon with a ribbon-cutting ceremony.

The ceremony was conducted by retiring police chief Dan Laffin, new police chief Roger Haney, and dispatch supervisor Jessica Flood, as well as the mayor of Lovell, Tom Newman. Laffin cut the ribbon to dedicate the building.

Last fall, the police department began moving into the building bit by bit until the move was finalized at the ceremony. Laffin said that one of his first goals when he was appointed as chief in July 2017 was to have an “autonomous police operation.”

The old police building, Laffin said, did not have enough square footage for the police department to operate ideally. The office space was stacked one on top of the other with people working too closely, he said.

Another major reason for the move was the high cost of rent at the county annex, he said.

“We were paying $30,000 in rent for a building that was inadequate for our space and size. Our operations were really restricted,” he said.

Throughout the years, Laffin and the police department explored various options for where the new police department building could be located. He said that this required a lot of special planning like talking to the mayor, town government and the town administrator.

Mayor Newman said that the new building features a lot of upgraded security features, like an upgraded restroom and holding cell, and a comprehensive camera security system.

Laffin said that some of the upgraded security features of the new building include a controlled access doorway and a few internal structural features. Cosmetically, the building has new furniture, which Laffin helped to pick out. But largely, the structure of the building remains the same, he said.

One of the biggest upgrades is the new concrete storage vault, Laffin said, where sensitive evidence can be stored. This vault allowed the department to reach compliance with federal standards for storing evidence. With the constraints of the old building, reaching the standards were very difficult, he said, and compliance had not been achieved at the time of the move.

Newman said that he is grateful to the county for their support in dispatching during the transition, which helped to make the transition period seamless. He is also grateful to the county commissioners and to Laffin for his leadership during the process, which he said was like “leading an orchestra.”