Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Police Services Complex topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Boca Raton council directs staff to pursue bond option for smaller police headquarters after heated debate over costs and communications
Summary
City staff proposed a reduced baseline police headquarters (about 94,000 sq ft) and outlined costs near $120 million fully programmed; councilmembers directed staff to pursue a bond referendum and community engagement including polling and an advisory panel while several members criticized outside political messaging that confused the public.
Mayor Thompson and city staff presented a revised approach to the Police Services Complex on May 26, asking the council for policy direction on engagement, funding and timing.
City Manager Sahaney told the council that staff and consultant ADG estimate the city’s near-term operational need at roughly 94,000 square feet, up from the current 60,000-square-foot facility. Sahaney said building costs for that footprint were a rough $55 million, with site work near $20 million and program costs (furniture, technology and other turnkey items) likely to bring a fully programmed total “to about $120,000,000.”
Sahaney recommended a staged public process led by a community advisory panel and independent polling to gauge voters’ priorities, then return to council in October with site feedback and in November with a funding recommendation ahead of a possible March 27, 2027 ballot. “We want to start with a baseline of what we need today,” he said, and let engagement refine final scope and site choices.
Acting Police Chief Dubinsky described immediate operational shortfalls the new facility is intended to solve: insufficient briefing space that forces some briefings outdoors, detective units split across locations that hinder information sharing, and evidence and property-storage capacity that has been outgrown. “Our briefing room currently does not have the capacity to hold our briefings,” Dubinsky said. “We’ve done a lot of conversions of closets — they’re now housing two or three employees who have desks inside of them.”
Council debate was extended and sometimes heated. Several councilmembers criticized an email campaign by the political organization Save Boca that circulated versions of earlier, larger project numbers, saying the messages misled residents. Councilmember Perlman — who identified his dual role as a councilmember and chairman of the Save Boca political committee — defended the group’s outreach but acknowledged the controversy over messaging. Mayor Thompson pressed for transparency, saying staff had been working since the March referendum to reduce scope and cost.
Members also debated timeline and delivery method: some urged a faster, hybrid design-build approach to limit cost escalation, citing other Florida cities’ fast-track projects; others stressed the need for robust public education and polling before placing a bond on the ballot.
On the central funding question, the council coalesced around asking voters for borrowed proceeds rather than using all reserves. Multiple members signaled support for a bond referendum in the general range of $100 million to $125 million to finance the reduced-scope project while protecting reserves against possible state-level property-tax changes. The council did not adopt formal ballot language at the workshop but gave staff direction to proceed with outreach, polling and bond planning for council consideration.
Next steps outlined by staff include forming the community advisory panel, retaining independent polling, refining the preliminary program based on outreach and returning to council with recommended ballot language and a recommended site-selection approach later in the year.
