The city Police Bureau is moving its East Liberty station from Penn Circle to the former state police driver's licensing facility on Washington Boulevard in Highland Park.

	Andy Starnes, Post-Gazette The Zone 5 police station on Penn Circle in East Liberty, which for nearly eight decades has housed police as well as firefighters from Engine Co. 8, has become partially obsolete, Assistant Police Chief William Bochter said. Click photo for larger image.

The East Liberty building, which for nearly eight decades has done double duty housing police from Zone 5 and firefighters from Engine Co. 8, has become partially obsolete, Assistant Police Chief William Bochter said yesterday.

The transition could be completed by the end of the summer, said Chief Bochter, who heads police operations.

Firefighters said they have not been informed about their unit moving out with police.

"I don't want to move," said Fire Bureau Capt. Jim Wyzomirski, a 15-year veteran who has spent his career in East Liberty.

For firefighting, the station is strategically located in a neighborhood that he describes as "one of the busiest in the city."

The police officers from "The Fighting Fifth," a term coined about 20 years ago, will move later this year to the Washington Boulevard building that now serves as headquarters for Pittsburgh Housing Authority police.

City police Cmdr. RaShall Brackney said the Penn Circle West building's roof leaks and the basement, where evidence lockers are maintained, has sewer problems.

The problems are irreparable or too costly to fix, police administrators have said.

It was built in 1929 during the administration of Pittsburgh Mayor Charles H. Kline, according to a plaque posted near the entrance.

"All this stuff was already in the works before I got here in February," Cmdr. Brackney said. "If we are moved, I will report there. The facility [on Washington Boulevard] is newer."

The move dovetails with the city's decision to retrain the authority's officers, all of whom are being trained at the city police academy next door. Those officers will be melded into the city Police Bureau when their training is complete.

Moving the station will not diminish the police presence in Zone 5, police Chief Nathan Harper said last week.

"We want citizens to rest assured that when we move a police station out of its zone, that doesn't mean that we're vacating," Chief Harper said. "Very seldom do we answer calls from out of the zone, so, therefore, the coverage will remain the same."