Snellville Proud of New Police Station

Today I attended the ribbon cutting of Snellville Police Department's new state-of-the-art precinct. The 30,000 square-foot police station was paid for using SPLOST funds.

Ceremonial scissors await official duty/Photo: Darla Dixon/My Snellville Blog

SPLOST stands for Special Local Option Sales Tax. In other words, pennies here and there from sales taxes in the city paid for this, so the tax wasn't paid only by Snellville citizens, but by people spending money when they have shopped in Snellville. Now you see why I always pick up a penny if I find one on the ground! It really adds up, doesn't it?

Photo by Darla Dixon/My Snellville Blog

Above: Russell Treadway (City Manager), Mike Sabbagh (City Council Member), Kelly Kautz (Council), Tom Witts (Council), Barbara Bender (Council/Mayor Pro-Tem), Melvin Everson (Governor's Office of Workforce Development & former council member); Mayor Jerry Oberholtzer, and Snellville Police Chief Roy Whitehead pose right before cutting the ribbon.

I was happy to see our Snellville Police officers so excited too. Their pride in the facility is evident as they showed me the interviewing room and the K-9 office. This is the first police station in Snellville that was built originally to be a police station. All other facilities have been old utility buildings and such that have been retro-fitted to serve the police. This station was built based on input from police personnel, so it has been built to be safe (practically instant lock-down ability, for example) and efficient.

A view of the crowd - Photo by Darla Dixon/My Snellville Blog

The attendees were a regular "who's who" of Snellville and Gwinnett County.  All citizens were invited to attend. Members of the Snellville Commerce Club were in attendance, as well as police and fire personnel from neighboring cities like Norcross and Lilburn.

Lawrenceville's newly-elected Mayor Judy Johnson was there, as well as Charlotte Nash, candidate for Gwinnett County Commissioner; Melvin Everson, Director of the Governor's Office of Workforce Development;  Emmett Clower, former Mayor of Snellville, and  Wayne Odum and Warren Auld, former members of the Snellville City Council, whose work over the years was recognized as having a hand in bringing the project to fruition.

People from all around are starting to notice that great things are happening in Snellville, and when people sense a positive thing, they want to be a part of it. I'm glad I'm a part of it, and very proud of Snellville today.