Executive
Waste of the Day: New Baltimore Police Training Could Cost $330 Million
A new state-of-the-art police academy for Baltimore could cost $330 million, and the only rationale is that this is an architect’s design.
A plan to relocate Baltimore’s police training academy to a state-of-the-art facility has a price tag of at least $330 million, The Baltimore Sun reported.
In 2020, the Baltimore Police Department moved its training facility to the University of Baltimore, where it has a five-year lease with annual rent roughly $1.4 million.
The Baltimore PD isunder a 2017 consent decree with the Department of Justice to remedy constitutional violations. As part of that, the DOJ found the police department had deficient training infrastructure, including “outdated, ill-repaired” facilities. They relocated to the University of Baltimore to remedy that.
The DOJ said that relocation significantly upgraded its training spaces, but it also found ongoing issues with the shooting ranges, which it said would need to be remedied before it was in compliance with the consent decree.
Recently $450,000 in state money was used for an architectural firm to create a “preliminary design report” to relocate the training facility to Coppin State University, for an estimated $330 million, for a state-of-the-art facility.
Democratic state Sen. Antonio Hayes secured the $450,000 from the Maryland General Assembly for the study and acknowledged the estimated price tag is “a lot.”
He said that creating the facility would require the “political will of participating parties.” No funding sources have been identified, and Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott said that the initial study is “just beginning to be assessed.” He didn’t say whether the project would be a priority for his administration.
Police training is important and a community’s trust in their police is also important, but such a pricey facility shouldn’t be built just because an architectural firm drew it up.
The #WasteOfTheDay is brought to you by the forensic auditors at OpenTheBooks.com
This article was originally published by RealClearInvestigations and made available via RealClearWire.
Adam Andrzejewski (say: Angie-eff-ski) was the CEO/founder of OpenTheBooks.com. Before dedicating his life to public service, Adam co-founded HomePages Directories, a $20 million publishing company (1997-2007). His works have been featured on the BBC, Good Morning America, ABC World News Tonight, C-SPAN, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, USA Today, FOX News, CNN, National Public Radio (NPR), Forbes, Newsweek, and many other national media.
Today, OpenTheBooks.com is the largest private repository of U.S. public-sector spending. Mission: post "every dime, online, in real time." In 2022, OpenTheBooks.com captured nearly all public expenditures in the country, including nearly all disclosed federal government spending; 50 of 50 state checkbooks; and 25 million public employee salary and pension records from 50,000 public bodies across America.
The group's aggressive transparency and forensic auditing of government spending has led to the assembly of grand juries, indictments, and successful prosecutions; congressional briefings, hearings, and subpoenas; Government Accountability Office (GAO) audits; Congressional Research Service (CRS) reports; federal legislation; and much more.
Our Honorary Chairman - In Memoriam is U.S. Senator Tom Coburn, MD.
Andrzejewski's federal oversight work was included in the President's Budget To Congress FY2021. The budget cited his organization by name, bullet-pointed their findings, and footnoted/hyperlinked to their report.
Posted on YouTube, Andrzejewski's presentation, The Depth of the Swamp, at the Hillsdale College National Leadership Seminar 2020 in Naples, Florida received 3.8 million views.
Andrzejewski has spoken at the Columbia School of Journalism, Harvard Law School and the law schools at Georgetown and George Washington regarding big data journalism. As a senior policy contributor at Forbes, Adam had nearly 20 million pageviews on 206 published investigations. In 2022, investigative fact-finding on Dr. Fauci's finances led to his cancellation at Forbes.
In 2022, Andrzejewski did 473 live television and radio interviews across broadcast, major cable platforms, and radio shows. Andrzejewski is the author of The Waste of the Day column at Real Clear Policy. The column is syndicated by Sinclair Broadcast Group, owners of nearly 200 ABC, NBC, CBS, and FOX affiliates across USA.
Andrzejewski passed away in his sleep at his home in in Hinsdale, Illinois, on August 18, 2024. He is survived by his wife Kerry and three daughters. He also served as a lector at St. Isaac Jogues Catholic Church and finished the Chicago Marathon eight times (PR 3:58.49 in 2022).
Waste of the Day articles published after August 18, 2024 are considered posthumous publications.
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