Police HQ — historic monument?

Oh bureaucracy. The things we do in the name of satisfying your weird quirks.

Case in point: As of Monday night, the circa 1978 Vancouver Police Headquarters at 605 Evergreen Blvd. is now a historic monument.

Whaaaaa?

We get the low down from city Program and Policy Manager Jan Bader:

It’s to get around a clause that unless the city, once its done using the land and building as police HQ, used the land for a public transportation purposes, it goes back to the federal government — for free.

“While we have no immediate plans to redevelop the property, long term the Historic Reserve Partners would like to do something with that’s more congruent with the historic site and that reversionary clause really narrows any possible reuse options (bus station anyone?)”

So it’s not the building — it’s the land, where records show old army barracks stood — that’s historic.

Bader said there’s willing federal staff who have agreed approve the monument status (despite the fact that building technically has to be 50 years old) right now, so she’s striking while the iron is hot.

She’s even got the feds to agree that police HQ doesn’t need the historical monument plaque that usually is put in.

While there aren’t plans for redevelopment, Bader said she does have one change in mind:

“When the Community Connector (for the Columbia River Crossing) is built, I’d love to get that communications tower relocated so that’s not the dominant feature people are seeing as they walk east across the connector,” Bader wrote.

But we like the idea that she said city General Services Director Tim Haldeman suggested: “We paint it green and try to pass it off as a giant tree.”