SYLMAR : Police Outline Plans for New Academy

Residents will see more patrol cars, gain recreation facilities and experience few negative impacts from a proposed police training academy near Olive View Medical Center, police officials told members of the Sylmar Chamber of Commerce on Monday.

The academy will be more like a community college campus than the colossus of flying bullets, chanting cadets and hovering helicopters portrayed by opponents, said Steve Hatfield, assistant commander of the Los Angeles Police Department’s police facilities construction group.

Hatfield said the Police Department has scaled back its plans for the site, eliminating plans for a firing range, cutting parking spaces from 1,000 to 600 and adding trail access and parking for equestrians who want to use nearby Wilson Canyon.

“There never will be a firearm fired on this campus at any time,” Hatfield assured the 35 chamber members during a luncheon at Olive View Medical Center. The firing range, instead of being at the Olive View site, will be built elsewhere.

Residents will also have access to a running track, gymnasium and classrooms and meeting facilities, in what the department hopes will be a campus that is open to community groups, Hatfield said.

The plan to locate the academy on county land near Olive View Medical Center has drawn criticism from a local Crime Watch and an equestrian group, none of whom sent members to the meeting. The chamber strongly supports the academy.

Chamber President Frank Jacobs urged homeowners and business people to tell the Los Angeles Police Department what they want included in the $40-million, 24-acre facility.

Some members said they were worried that recruits would jog on horse trails, or that gangs would be attracted to commit destructive activities near the academy as part of initiation rites.

Recruits will use only paved or multi-use trails, Hatfield said. Hatfield said concerns about gangs come from a false allegation that gang members have taunted officers at the Elysian Park academy.

If anything, Hatfield said, more patrol cars will keep gangs out.

The Sylmar site is the department’s top choice because it would eliminate driving time for Valley-based officers attending retraining courses and enable the department to take advantage of Olive View’s amenities, such as medical care for recruits and a helicopter pad.