Alabama renovating major building in Capitol complex
A $20 million renovation of the state's old Public Safety Building is scheduled for completion this summer, when it will become home to the state attorney general's office and the state Department of Homeland Security.
Jeff Samuel, special projects coordinator for the state Finance Department, said the work that began in February 2007 should be finished by July 16.
The building is across the street from the Capitol and fronts on Montgomery's main street, Dexter Avenue. It was built in the 1930s as a Works Progress Administration project. It housed the Department of Public Safety until the department moved to the state's Criminal Justice Center in 2004.
Samuel said the renovation retained the building's brass doors, brass trim in the elevators, and large state seal on the lobby floor.
"It is really going to be a beautiful, retro-looking building inside because it will be the original brass work in there," he said.
The renovation of the building has included the addition of two wings for more office space. The attorney general's office, now located in the Statehouse, will occupy about two-thirds of the 117,000-square-foot building. The Department of Homeland Security, now in a downtown office building, will take up 5,300 square feet.
Once the attorney general's office moves out of the Statehouse, that will provide more space for the Legislature, which occupies about half of the building.
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