BLOOMSBURG -- The Bloomsburg police station has been in the same building on Main Street since 1889, and according to Police Chief Roger Van Loan, it has only been remodeled once or twice since then.
"It gave us a little more office space, but it didn't give us more space in the critical areas needed for the patrol officers to do their work," Van Loan said.
But if all goes according to plan, the Bloomsburg Police Department will have a new home -- the American Red Cross building on 7th Street.
Recently town council voted to buy the building for $400,000 for the police department, because the department outgrew its current station.
"There's just not enough room in our men's shower and the locker room actually has boxes stacked in it because there's no room to put anything," Van Loan said.
The chief says the Red Cross building is about three times the size of the current station.
The chief says he's also excited to move into this building because it's located right across the street from the Columbia County Jail.
Van loan also says the new building will be safer when bringing in prisoners.
"Right now we bring them from the public street into our station. In the new station, we'll be able to pull into a sally port and close the doors," Van Loan said.
"I don't think it makes much of a difference to the town at all," Nick McGaw said.
Nick McGaw owns a business on Main Street and says it doesn't bother him that the police station will be further away.
"I'm not sure that it's really going to affect much of Bloomsburg. We're a small town and when you move around in a small town, you're still in a small town," McGaw said.
Other people say they are concerned about the police leaving Main Street.
"I'm not really sure about it. I think they should probably be in town," Linda Boyer said.
Van Loan says an officer will still be staffed at the current station on Main Street because parking tickets will still be paid there. Officials expect the deal to close by the end of the year, and the chief hopes to move into the new building by next summer.