New LAPD station to reclaim community

The new LAPD Rampart station near downtown L.A. was dedicated Thursday morning.

As LAPD Chief William Bratton put it, the old station had a checkered past, and the opening of the new building represents the dawning of a new day for the LAPD, and the reclaiming of the community.

City officials and the community gathered to celebrate the opening of the 54,000 square feet station that sits on a four-acre site on Sixth Street.

The state of the art green facility cost $37 million and includes thousands of feet of open space and natural lighting. There's a room for the community to use for meetings, a fully-equipped gym for officers with a view of the downtown skyline.

Authorities said the building is open and welcoming, designed to make residents feel protected rather than fearful.

Bratton said he hopes it will erase memories of the negativity associated with the Rampart station in the 90s.

"Cause beginning today, this station, that in the 90s, and some of its members, some members of this police department, were symbols of racism, of corruption, of brutality," Bratton said.

"That was not the Los Angeles Police Department. It is certainly not the Los Angeles Police Department of today."

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