With both North and South division buildings completely full, South Simcoe Police Service are preparing to move administrative staff to a new office.
The Bradford West Gwillimbury/Innisfil Police Services Board approved a five-year lease with InnPower for roughly 470 square metres (5060.5 sq. ft.) of additional office space, plus 29 parking spaces at the InnPower building at 7251 Yonge St., Innisfil, during the meeting at the Innisfil Town Hall on Tuesday, Sept. 25.
The service also plans to rent the space on the first floor for November and December of this year to provide time for security and other renovations with an anticipated move-in date of Jan. 6, according to a report from Chief John Van Dyke.
“Both buildings are at maximum capacity for office space and parking,” Van Dyke said of existing divisions in the report, adding that if the lease had not been approved “operations would be severely impacted.”
The lease also includes sharing a common-use first-floor washroom, the lunchroom and training room, plus the option to renew for three years, as well as the right of first refusal to rent any additional space in the building that may become available.
That could become important as the service continues to grow.
“This will give us a maximum five years worth of breathing room at the very most,” Van Dyke said.
Board chair Chris Gariepy also stressed that the lease is “an interim step,” and not a long-term solution, for which it will likely take the service “five to seven years” to find a future location for expansion.
In the meantime, Van Dyke emphasized that only civilian staff are planned to move from Bradford, not police officers, while a combination of civilian staff and police officers would be moving from the nearby North Division building.
The lease is set to run from Jan. 1, 2025, to Dec. 1, 2029, with annual minimum lease rates starting at $70,847 for 2025 and growing to $80,968 by 2029, according to the report.
Including maintenance, interest and taxes (MIT), the report estimates annual cost starting at $130,600.88 in 2025 and growing to $149,234.14 by 2029.
That’s based on annual square-foot rates starting at $14 and growing to $16 for the lease, as well as starting at $11.81 and growing to an estimated $13.49 for MIT costs.
“We’re being treated very fair, (it’s) competitive to the market place,” Gariepy said.
Bradford Mayor James Leduc noted that when he last checked, the going annual square-foot rates for commercial space in Bradford’s urban area were about $26.
According to the report, the search for new space followed recommendations from Roth IAMS in November 2023, as they found both division buildings were at capacity, with the South Division in Bradford out of parking spaces, and noted an “immediate need” for an extra 343 sq. m (3,700 sq. ft.) of space.
At the time, the service found no suitable commercial office spaces available in Bradford or Innisfil.
Since then, the report explains InnPower began looking for ways to offset the costs of their building, since a “sizable portion” is now vacant following the shift to allow office staff to work primarily from home in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
