The Buckley Police Department took its first steps toward expanding space for police operations and the jail’s work release program, but plans are moving forward cautiously to accommodate the building code.

City Council members voted unanimously June 29 to approve the lease of a White River School District building across from the police station on Cedar Street. The agreement included an option to purchase the building in the future.

“It will probably be our operations that will move to the new building,” Police Chief Jim Arsanto said shortly after the council approval. “That includes patrol, investigations and IT and records. Those departments are all currently working out of a 500 square foot space on the top floor of the department building.”

It’s envisioned the Buckley jail’s work release program would move into the vacated space, Arsanto said. The jail’s work release program keeps reasonably safe prisoners in custody except during working hours. The program has been successful, but work release prisoners occupy space that could be bringing in revenue. The city has contracts with other jurisdictions to house prisoners, Arsanto said.

“An expansion into the top room at full capacity could possibly generate $200,000 for the general fund,” he said.

Both the Bonney Lake and Sumner police departments have contracts with the city of Buckley to use the latter city’s jail space for arrests.

Following the lease approval vote, the council voted to allow architectural firm Calvin Jordan and Associates to investigate potential building features that the city building department had predicted could preclude a jail expansion. CJ&A is the firm that originally designed the police department and jail building.

CJ&A confirmed that the code issues held enough weight to prevent an expansion of jail facilities as-is. Issues include a lack of a sprinkler system in that portion of the police department building.

CJ&A will be examining the facility to conduct a scope of work on renovations for the space. Company representatives are slated to meet with Arsanto at 10 a.m. today, Wednesday, to discuss their opinions of the project, the scope of work and the cost of installing sprinklers.

“We’re trying to move forward with it and we will continue to work with Calvin Jordan & Associates and the building department to determine what the code requires,” Arsanto said.