WHEELING — It took years in the making, but the Wheeling Police Department has officially moved its entire operation into its new headquarters at 2115 Chapline St. in Center Wheeling.

It was announced earlier this month that the big move to the new police facility was expected to be completed by Monday. Police officials confirmed on Monday that the transition was completed, and the men and women in blue have set up shop in their spacious new state-of-the-art home base.

While the address is new, the department’s telephone number — 304-234-3664 — remains the same. Officials said that if members of the public need to meet with an officer, file an in-person report or conduct business with police, parking is available in front of the building.

Over the past several weeks, the department had been making the transition from the old 4,500-square-foot police headquarters in the City-County Building at 1500 Chapline St. downtown to the new 30,000-square-foot building on the campus of the former Ohio Valley Medical Center.

Wheeling Police Chief Shawn Schwertfeger has been working out of the new location for a few weeks now, and he said everyone in the department was excited to finally be in the new headquarters.

“Working at this new facility is absolutely fantastic,” Schwertfeger said Monday. “Although we still have a good bit of work to do, it is rejuvenating to come to work every day and feel like the professionals that we are.”

Schwertfeger said there are a number of loose ends that still need to be addressed in the big transition. Evidence must be moved, finishing touches in the booking portion of the building must be hammered out and some temporary parking issues still must be resolved.

The renovation of the old hospital building into the new police headquarters was designed with use of the adjacent Center Wheeling Parking Garage in mind. Since construction began, however, the parking garage was closed due to structural issues and is expected to be razed after the Wheeling Fire Department headquarters moves out of the lower level of the facility and relocates to its new headquarters being built in East Wheeling.

Ground was broken on the new police headquarters in September of 2021. The Waller Corporation of Washington, Pennsylvania. secured the general contract to renovate OVMC’s former Valley Professional Building. The $6.5 million renovation was originally expected to be completed late last year, but supply chain issues caused some delays.

The Wheeling Police Department had been operating in the old facility since 1959 and outgrew the antiquated space decades ago, officials said. The new headquarters not only has much more space, but also has modern training facilities and equipment, spacious evidence rooms, a full-size fitness center, a lunch room, office spaces for various departments and women’s restrooms – one of the many features lacking in the old space.

A $1 million federal earmark for new technology systems in the new headquarters was received by the city to help equip the multi-level building with modern training simulators, computer systems and more. Officials said these accommodations and more help put the department on the leading edge of local law enforcement agencies in the state of West Virginia.

“This has been a long time coming and a dream I have dreamt for nearly a decade,” Schwertfeger said. “Many thanks are necessary, from the beginning of the process to those employees who have stepped up in a big way to assist in the design and move to this wonderful facility. There are lots of smiling faces around here.”

Now that the department has vacated its space in the City-County Building, city leaders said this will open the door for other city departments to eventually relocate to 1500 Chapline St. in the future.

According Wheeling City Manager Robert Herron, the Wheeling Parks and Recreation Department — which had moved into space on the OVMC campus after the city acquired the hospital property — will likely be moving into the City-County Building. The Planning and Building Department may possibly be affected by the reshuffling, and the Water and Sewer billing department may likely be moved to the accessible space formerly occupied by the police department near the building’s main first-floor entrance.

“There are no time frames yet as much work needs to be done in the former police department space,” Herron said. “Plus, with the major renovation project coming to the City-County Building, we may need to use that space for temporary city offices as each office in the building is closed for the renovations during the time that the contractor is on each floor of this building.”