The Rose Center will open its doors as the new University Police headquarters and a community learning center in early 2006.

The 36,000-square-foot center, located on Ashmun Street behind Swing Space, will house an expanded Yale Police station and various community resources, University Police spokesman Lt. Michael Patten said. Community members will have access to a public meeting space, 15 computer stations and storage areas for athletic equipment for the nearby park, he said.

Bruce Alexander, vice president of New Haven and state affairs, said opportunities will exist for Yale students to become involved in tutoring and athletics programs sponsored by his office for youths in the surrounding Dixwell neighborhood. The community activities will likely be held in the afternoons and evenings, he said.

“The University has worked closely with the community over many months to create the Dixwell-Yale Community Learning Center … for Yale students and staff to work side by side with neighborhood young people,” Alexander said.

Patten said the police department will also reach out to the surrounding community and work with local youth in various programs, although many details are still uncertain.

The completion of the center, in addition to providing new community resources and opportunities, will finally allow University Police to consolidate into one large space.

Presently the Yale Police operate out of three separate facilities: the current headquarters on Sachem Street, a communications center in Phelps Gate, and a substation at 270 Congress Ave. The new station will replace both the “inadequate and undersized” headquarters and the Old Campus dispatchers, Patten said, while the office on Congress Avenue will be maintained.

Patten said the single space will allow for ease of communication in the department and the central location allows police to continue to respond efficiently. The facility will also feature a training area with the latest audio-visual technologies for officers.

“The department’s grown a lot and the University was gracious enough to build a new station,” he said.

William Rawn ’65 of William Rawn Associates in Boston designed the space, which is being constructed by the DIMEO Construction Company. The center is named after Deborah Rose ’72 GRD ’89, who supervised a major monetary contribution for the construction of the building through the Deborah Rose Foundation and the Sandra P. and Frederick P. Rose Foundation.

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