Miami Twp. to upgrade security in building

Work aims to increase protection for staff, public, officials say.

Renovations to MIAMI TWP. — increase security in Miami Twp.’s police department and administration building are designed to provide more protection to staff and the public, officials said.

The more than $500,000 in work started this week at the Lyons Road facilities also will include installing cameras to record activities in the meeting room on the second floor of the administration building, where trustees and various other panels meet, officials said.

Most of the changes will occur within the police department. The first phase will involve shifting administrative offices from the second floor to the ground floor and moving the detective section from the first floor to the second, said Miami Twp. Capt. Russell Johnson.

“That in itself will provide for a more secure setting to conduct detective visits as far as interviewing” witnesses and suspects, Johnson said.

The second phase “will really start enhancing security in the building” as the work will focus on areas of the department where citizens can lodge complaints, he said.

“We’ll put those (offices) more into a configuration where the access doors are secure where we conduct those interviews in a certain portion of the building,” Johnson said.

“And those individuals are more or less ... isolated to that area,” he added. “Now, once you get into the facility, you don’t have that much isolation.”

Renovations to the administration building will include recon-

figuring service windows in the lobby to better protect staff assisting visitors, said Tim Wiley, project manager for BWSC/Emersion, a consultant on the project.

The upstairs work at the administration building will include shifts to enhance communications between public officials, the audience and those speaking at the podium, Wiley said.

The changes will also involve installing cameras to record meetings, said Kyle Hinkelman, the township’s deputy community development director. Meetings in that room have been recorded only by audio.

Township trustees last month adopted a measure calling for Acting Administrator Ron Hess to enter into an agreement with Becker Construction to upgrade facilities.

Becker will be paid up to $545,523, township records show.

The company submitted a base bid of $474,368, while Bilbrey Construction’s base bid was $525,586, records show. The work will be funded with money collected in the Tax Increment Financing district around the Dayton Mall, according to the township.

The project is expected to be completed in about six months, officials said.