Huntington Beach Police Department launches training center
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The Huntington Beach Police Department has a new training center on Gothard Street, in its own backyard.
The facility, which features a 6,000-square-foot K9 training field and a 2,500-square-foot Simunitions and Tactical Training Building, launched with a ribbon-cutting ceremony and demonstrations on Feb. 22.
“We plan to use this continuously to get our officers better prepared, fully prepared to handle any situation that arises,” Huntington Beach Police Chief Eric Parra said. “It’s such a benefit for us because it’s close, it’s here and it provides top-quality technology, top-quality systems. It’s a pretty dynamic and technology-driven system that’s really going to benefit the officers and the community.”
The K9 training field, which has synthetic turf and lighting for night training, features plenty of obstacles to get the police dogs a wide variety of reps, Parra said. It was named in honor of K9 Kim, a Huntington Beach police canine who was stabbed to death while apprehending a fleeing subject in 1991.
“When we put [the trained dogs] into tactical environments, it’s not a surprise for them,” Parra said. “We already know how they’re going to react, because we’ve trained them in that environment. It’s much safer for them, safer for the handler, safer for the public.”
The field was completed at the end of 2023 as part of the project’s first phase.
The Simunitions and Tactical Training Building features the ability to build a house with movable walls, Huntington Beach Police Capt. Oscar Garcia said. “This enables the department to do movement training with recruits, patrol officers and even our SWAT team.”
“When we’re preparing for warrants and operations that we can pre-plan for, we can set that facility up to kind of mimic that environment that we’re going into,” Parra said. “It makes it much safer for the officers, much safer for the public.”
In addition to the movable walls, there’s an interior camera system and sound system for creating chaos, like people yelling.
“It also has lights that can be dimmed, so we can work in low lighting,” Garcia said. “At the north end, we have a breaching door, so we can actually train as a group breaching a house and making entry.”
There’s also a tear gas training container for controlled simulations.
Parra said the training center cost about $1.1 million, the majority of which was covered by donations. At the entrance to the facility is a donor wall, featuring engraved shields with personal dedications.
Contractor Westling and Associates also donated about 700 work hours. It’s owner, Josh Westling, is the board secretary of the Huntington Beach Police and Community Foundation.
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