The Los Angeles Department of Public Works is seeking Los Angeles County Board approval to make key preliminary project decisions in preparation for the proposed Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Pitchess Emergency Vehicle Operations Center project.

The vote, set to take place on Tuesday, Feb. 4, would pertain to key decisions in the construction process, including the approval of the project budget and executing a contract with the proposed construction firm.

The proposed project at the Peter J. Pitchess Detention Center in Castaic, would include a 5,600-foot long high-speed training track, a 4,000-foot long pursuit track arranged in a grid pattern, a role-play training village with five small structures to simulate a housing environment, a skid recovery training area including a wet skidpad, a collision-avoidance training area, training office and classroom buildings and other area improvements.

The completed project area is approximately 1,937,000 square feet or approximately 44.5 acres of land at Pitchess, located on the 29300 block of The Old Road in Castaic.

The proposed project budget is currently estimated to be around $15.5 million.

The LASD currently operates an EVOC at the Pomona Fairgrounds which has been used for over 35 years to provide training in emergency vehicle operations to deputy sheriff trainees and police officers enrolled in LASD’s Academy, in addition to ongoing vehicle operations training for LASD staff, according to officials.

However, the current agreement between the LASD and the Los Angeles County Fair Association requires the EVOC office to shut down for approximately two to three months every year for major events, such as the L.A. County Fair and the National Hot Rod Association.

These interruptions, in combination with recent changes posed by the California Commission Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) — requires that officers are expected to log approximately 40 hours of training instead of the previous 24 hours required, in addition to nighttime driver’s training — “has created a training bottleneck for staff seeking to meet their POST requirements,” according to County officials.

In May 2015, officials reviewed several other potential locations, including the Los Angeles Police Department Granada Hills EVOC facility and the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department EVOC facility, according to County documents.

However, these locations were found to be infeasible due to a lack of required acreage and scheduling conflicts with their current operations. Pitchess was determined to be the most feasible choice by County officials for the new site.

The project is tentatively expected to be under construction nearer to 2022, according to County documents.

The L.A. County Board of Supervisors Meeting is scheduled for 9:30 a.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 4.

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