Tehachapi dedicates state-of-the-art police station

The June 27, 2014 official dedication and open house for the new Tehachapi Police Department building on 220 West C St. drew dignitaries and members of the public eager to see the state-of-the-art facility. Retiring Chief of Police Jeff Kermode – who had the task of forming the police department in 2007 when the city chose to establish its own department rather than extending a contract with the Kern County Sheriffs Office – swore in the new chief, Kent Kroeger, whose father Joe pinned on his badge. The department, from cramped quarters on F Street next to City Hall, moved into the building a few blocks away in a classic urban infill success story. The renovated structure was built in 1956 as a children's sleepwear and playwear garment factory and subsequently was used as a research and development lab for respiratory therapy medical devices (Ray Johnson, director of operations for Salter Labs, who called the building the company's "Skunk Works" after the famous Lockheed facility, said the industry-standard nasal cannula was developed and designed in the building). The renovation inscluded reinforcement of the walls by creating an exoskeleton of carbon fiber and the construction of a raised roof area with clerestory windows that usher in natural light. The emergency operations center, which is also a community meeting room, is set up for disasters. The building is pre-wired to be a dispatch center should the city choose to end its dispatch contract with the Bear Valley Springs Police Department. The Tehachapi PD has 16 sworn officers, who have locker rooms, an exercise room and individual cubicles for writing reports. The city financed the $4 million project in-house.