Dream coming true in Pankey
LR starts construction of community center, police station
A more than decade-long dream of the Pankey community in Little Rock is getting closer to reality now that the city has begun construction on a police substation and community center there.
About 3,815 square feet of the building at 13700 Cantrell Road will be used as a substation of the Little Rock Police Department’s northwest patrol division, which covers about half of the city’s residents. The remaining 2,600 square feet will house a community center.
The Pankey Community Improvement Association Inc., which owns the building, has been trying to put a community center on the property for years. It received a state grant for the project, but work stalled in 2002 when the Arkansas Legislative Audit investigated the bid process and the association’s financial record-keeping. A shell of a building has sat unfinished since then.
When the city promised $1 million in tax revenue toward a police substation in west Little Rock during a 2011 campaign for a 1 percentage point sales-tax increase, the idea was suggested to complete the Pankey center and put the substation there to accomplish two goals.
“The Pankey community has been looking to build a community center a long, long time,” said Ward 4 City Director Brad Cazort, who represents the area.
The city’s $1.3 million construction on the substation and community center began in mid-October. In addition to tax revenue, some funds are coming from the Fleet Services Department and from a 911/311 account. Moser Construction is leading the project. The building is to open in the spring.
The Police Department is divided into three patrol divisions — downtown, northwest and southwest.
Right now, the 84-employee northwest patrol division operates out of a station on Kanis Road. The new substation will eventually allow that division to split its staff, with patrol officers and detectives serving the area north of Interstate 430 operating out of the Kanis location and others serving south of I-430 operating out of the Pankey substation.
“It will take us some time personnel-wise to be full strength, but having that [Pankey] facility there is a step in the right direction. We’ll have better patrol,” Police Chief Kenton Buckner said. “It will give us a footprint in an area where our city is growing the fastest.”
The addition of the substation also would shorten response times to calls for police service in areas south of I-430 that are served by the northwest patrol division, Buckner said.
The substation, which will have a fuel station for police and other city employees, will allow patrol officers to be more efficient with their time in general, Ward 5 City Director and Vice Mayor Lance Hines said.
“Not only are the guys going to be able to start their patrol out of there, they are also putting a fueling station there. Right now, if an officer has to refuel, he has to drive all the way back to Kanis. This is also going to allow our fire support to refuel out of that station,” Hines said.
“You’re going to have the officers that patrol our districts in the northwestern part of the city start their patrol closer to their districts than they do now. That’s really the main benefit, and just the folks out in west Little Rock knowing we have a police presence,” he added. “Another great benefit is to the Pankey community. It’s been a long time coming on their community center. I think it will help to stabilize the area.”
The city will lease the space for the police substation from the Pankey Community Improvement Association. A 25-year lease agreement that will begin once the building is complete has an option to renew for another 25 years, if agreed upon by both parties.
The city will receive credit toward its lease payments for the first several years, up to the amount the city contributed to building the structure. After that, the city will pay rent.
For the first five years, rent is calculated at $13 per square foot per year. That totals $49,595 per year. For the last 20 years of the agreement, rent will be $13.50 per square foot, or $51,502.50 per year.
A previous agreement and effort to start construction on the building in 2012 was stalled after city board members had questions about how the relationship between the city and the Pankey Community Improvement Association would work.
Under the current agreement, the association will own the community center, while the city will operate the police station separately.
Brenda Norwood, a board member of the Pankey Community Improvement Association, said Friday that the association wasn’t ready to release the details of who will run the community center. She said the association is excited to work with the city on getting the center built.
It will serve more than just the Pankey neighborhood, she said.
“It will benefit many communities west of Little Rock. Our seniors out here don’t have a place to gather and have activities. We see it as a place for students and children to do some after-school tutoring and after-school programs,” Norwood said. “We don’t have a central place for those things to happen right now.”
She said there also has been discussion of holding continuing education courses, such as General Educational Development classes, in the center. The association will work with many partners to host activities in the center, Norwood said.
The dual role of the building is similar to what will occur in the newly constructed 12th Street Police Station. There, a section of the station will be open to the public and occupied by several nonprofits or businesses, which could include restaurants, banks or retail stores, officials have said.
“When you have an area with the police and community sharing a space, that makes it easy to share ideas, to share common destinations, talk about common problems and then to try to deal with some of the real causes to some of those problems,” Buckner said. “Having the community in the facility with police, like the 12th Street station, will do nothing but improve relations.”