City of Lawrence Breaks the Ground for the New Lawrence Police Station
The Lawrence Police Department Move-in to the New and Modern 4-story Building Expected to Be During Summer of 2025
LAWRENCE, MA –, October 11, 2022. In a ceremonial event, Mayor Brian A. DePeña and Lawrence Police Department’s Chief Roy P. Vasque were joined by Governor Charles D. Baker, Lt. Gov Karyn Polito, Senator Barry Finegold, Representative Frank Moran, the Lawrence City Council and city officials to break the ground for the new Lawrence Police Station, a sixty-million-dollar ($60,000.00) project supported by the Commonwealth’s capital budget plan.
“Public Safety is one the foremost vital issues in a community, and citizens need to be safe,” said Mayor De Peña. “For instance, I will continue implementing my multi-faceted action plan by investing more in crime prevention strategies and rebuilding community relations to execute our economic prosperity plan.”
The ceremony took place on the future site of the station, which is across from the current Police Station, located at 90 Lowell Street. The 64,000-square-foot project will provide the city with a state-of-the-art facility with the latest equipment and technology to boost our public safety.
“We hardly ever allocate state funding to build a police department in a municipality, but the Lawrence Police Department deserves our full support to equip the brave men and women in uniform with the necessary tools to protect our citizens and businesses. I don’t support defunding the police,” said Governor Baker.
A vital component of the project is to make the building community friendly, with a large community room as a focal point at its entrance. These and many other features and amenities at the new station will allow the Department to serve better the needs of the residents they are sworn to serve.
“I am so proud that we will finally have a state-of-the-art police station that reflects the quality of our police department,” said Senator Barry Finegold. “This day has been over two decades in the making. Establishing this police station has been one of my top priorities as Lawrence’s Senator, and I have enjoyed working with city officials and my partners in the state delegation to build support for the project. Over several years, we had to convince multiple Senate Presidents, House Speakers, and Chairmen of the Ways and Means Committee to fund this project. The new police station will keep our community safer and help ensure that Lawrence remains a great place to live.”
The project timeline is as follows: The study and early design have been completed. The design is expected to be done by the summer of 2023. The construction is expected to be completed in the spring of 2025. The Police Department move-in is expected to be in the summer of 2025.
“The men and women of the Lawrence Police are the hardest working and most dedicated police officers in the Commonwealth. As such, they are so deserving of this new station. I am extremely grateful to Governor Baker and Lieutenant Governor Polito, as well as to our state and local officials, both past and present, including former Mayors, for their dedication to this project. Mayor Brian A. De Peña’s support for this project began as a City Councilor. As Mayor, he has continued to overwhelmingly support the building of a police station that all of the residents of the City will be proud of,” said Chief Roy Vasque.
“I am proud of the City Council’s work through the years. We never gave up and partnered with mayors, legislators, and governors at every step. When this new station is completed, it will enhance the tools to make our residents’ safety a local government priority, said the President of the City Council, Marc Laplante.”
This very day around 2:00 pm, the Lawrence Police Department also welcomed nine (9) new members sworn in by Mayor De Peña in his office to continue making the City safer. Names of the new police officers are Officer Mikel Beltrán, Officer Juan Gómez, Officer Ángelo Kocagoz, Officer Andrés Llerena, Officer Víctor Martínez, Officer Miguel Peña, Officer Gregory Ovalles, Officer Steury Rodríguez and Officer Alejandro Taveras.
Synopsis of the Lawrence Police Department
In Lawrence Police Department: Heroes Wear Blue, Ronald J. DeSantis (1999), stated that: “During the 1870s, the Lawrence City Hall was once the site of the first city lockup. The prisoners were kept in wooden cells built into the archways of the basement. [Then] during the 1890s, the Police Station shared with the courthouse the red brick, Mansard-roofed, three-story building that stood on the corner of Lawrence Street and Common Street until 1914, which was torn down and replaced by a new structure. The new building stood at the corner of Lawrence Street and Common Street until it was also torn down in 1965 after the Department was transferred to its new headquarters inaugurated August 1965 on the present site of 90 Lowell Street.”
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