Although the Minnesota Legislature isn’t scheduled to reconvene until February 2026, the City of Eden Prairie already knows what it would like to ask for: funds to support the construction of a garage for specialized response vehicles.
Members of the state’s Senate Capital Investment Committee visited Eden Prairie on Oct. 30 to learn more about the proposed project. Eden Prairie was one stop on the group’s tour of over 30 metro-area sites of proposed projects throughout the week.
Eden Prairie’s ask to the Legislature would be for $2.233 million in funding to design, construct, furnish and equip a garage and storage facility to house regional fire, police and other public safety equipment to serve the city and surrounding communities.
Eden Prairie’s City Center is currently being remodeled in a project that will move the police department to the western two-thirds of the building and create indoor parking for squad cars. However, Eden Prairie Police Chief Matt Sackett said, since that remodel uses an existing building, there are limits to the height of its rooms.
“Big specialized vehicles can’t fit in there,” Sackett said. He described such vehicles as “big and tall.”
For instance, Eden Prairie currently has a Police and Fire Mobile Command Center that is slightly more than 33 feet long and 8 feet tall. The city is scheduled to take delivery in March of a new Mobile Command Center with even larger dimensions: 44 feet long and 8½ feet tall.
Currently, the fire and police departments’ specialized vehicles are stored in a variety of locations across the city, Eden Prairie Fire Chief Scott Gerber said. That means, he said, “timeliness is an issue” in response times.
A new garage would bring the vehicles to a centralized location near the police department “for the best response times possible,” according to a document the city provided to the Senate committee.
Gerber also noted that, in addition to Eden Prairie’s fire and police departments coordinating with each other, they also provide assistance to, and receive assistance from, additional communities. “They help us, we help them,” Gerber said.
Information provided to the Senate Capital Investment Committee called the new Mobile Command Center “a valuable asset (to) our surrounding partner agencies.” That information also said that the new garage space would house crisis negotiations and tactical response equipment utilized as part of a regional emergency response team.
Additionally, according to the information presented to the Senate committee, the new space would house equipment for an area Mobile Field Force group. The presentation stated that Eden Prairie’s emergency responders participate in ongoing training and response readiness should the need arise during civil unrest.
Without state monies, “The City of Eden Prairie does not have a funding plan for this critical infrastructure in order to benefit the city and surrounding communities,” according to the document provided to the Senate committee.
Sackett is scheduled to meet in November with a House finance committee about the proposed garage project.
Approval of state funding for the project during the next legislative session would require, first, an introduction of a bill tailored to the project. If that bill is approved by committee, it would be compiled into a larger bonding bill. Bonding bills require a three-fifths majority vote in each chamber of the Minnesota Legislature to pass.
