Council amends OPG garages RFP to require Northeast auxiliary lot be inside division boundaries

The Los Angeles City Council on March 17 approved an amendment to the city's request‑for‑proposals (RFP) for Official Police Garages (OPGs) that requires any auxiliary or satellite storage lot serving the Northeast Division to be located within the Northeast Division boundaries.

Council Member Hernandez said the RFP had ended up reflecting current storage configurations in ways that could favor incumbent operators and that the Northeast arrangement in particular had created community concerns where large satellite lots were sited outside the division. He proposed the amendment to require the Northeast auxiliary lot remain inside the division; the council approved the change and moved to release the RFPs for other divisions while holding Northeast for the corrected language.

What the staff told council

Detective Carson, assigned to the OPG contract work, said the RFP language was intended as guidance on how much space bidders would need to store vehicles and not to mandate satellite lots. He told the council that zoning constraints and the location of commercially zoned parcels had produced different physical arrangements across divisions and that staff could revise the Northeast language to require an in‑division auxiliary lot.

Council reaction and vote

Council Member Goldberg supported releasing the other RFPs while addressing Northeast separately; Council Member Stokowski asked staff to ensure the RFP does not bake in preferences for incumbents by treating existing configurations as fixed requirements. The amendment to item 17 was approved; the vote on the final, amended RFP was recorded as 12 ayes.

Ending

Staff said they would revise the RFP language for Northeast to require the auxiliary facility be within the division and proceed with the other division RFP releases. No timeline for release of Northeast was specified at the meeting.