After years of shifting timelines and political heartburn, El Paso’s long-delayed police and fire public safety complex is finally headed into full design. Formal design work is scheduled to begin in April 2026, setting the massive project on a more concrete path than it has had since voters first backed it at the ballot box.
The consolidated 50-acre campus is planned as a one-stop public safety hub, combining a joint training academy with new headquarters and vehicle maintenance facilities for both departments. City officials told council members the project is meant to replace aging buildings and bring modern training standards to first responders across the region.
Nearly seven years have passed since voters approved the 2019 public safety bond that is funding the project, and the timeline has repeatedly been reworked as officials reconsidered scope and costs. The 2019 bond package set aside roughly $413 million for public safety overall, and recent agenda materials put the police-fire campus’s share at roughly $200 million, according to KFOX14/CBS4.
What City Council approved
In a move city staff cast as a major milestone, the council on March 3 approved a design-build contract amendment that they say pushes the public safety complex into both design and construction phases. In a news release from the City of El Paso, officials said design work is expected to begin in April and that the campus is now projected for completion in 2029, barring any new setbacks.
The amendment clears the way for the city and its design-builder to hammer out a guaranteed maximum price and lock in the final site program. In other words, the project is finally moving from broad concepts to detailed schematics and hard numbers.
What the campus will include
The council packet includes a detailed guaranteed maximum price, or GMP, presentation that lays out the campus program and budget line by line. Plans call for a joint training academy anchored by an indoor dynamic shooting range, a driving pad, “Hogan’s Alley” scenario spaces, a combined fire tower, and vehicle maintenance and logistics facilities.
The presentation lists a construction budget of $128,152,730 and shows the overall training-and-headquarters investment landing somewhere in the $139 million to $200 million range; see the full breakdown in KFOX14/CBS4.
Why the site moved
This project has not only changed timelines; it has changed addresses. The city originally eyed a more than 300-acre parcel near Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard before relocating the complex to a 50-acre site on Global Reach Drive near El Paso International Airport.
Officials said terrain challenges, utility access and archaeological constraints at the first location made the smaller airport-adjacent site a better fit and could save about $22 million in development costs. They also emphasized that more than 1,400 acres near the original site would remain dedicated open space, according to a May 12, 2025 news release from the City of El Paso.
What happens next
With design work slated to kick off in April, the city and Jordan Foster Construction will refine the project’s scope and pricing and negotiate a guaranteed maximum price before shovels hit the ground. Officials have previously said they hope to break ground in 2026 and wrap construction in 2029.
City planners have pointed to pandemic-related delays, inflation and supply-chain pressures to explain earlier schedule slips. Even so, city leaders say the payoff will be worth the wait, arguing that the new campus will centralize training and significantly improve working conditions for El Paso’s first responders and the broader region they serve.
