Pleasant Hill: Multiple fires gut DVC police building

By ROMAN GOKHMAN | Bay Area News Group
PUBLISHED: June 23, 2008 at 8:54 pm | UPDATED: August 15, 2016 at 6:22 pm
PLEASANT HILL — An arson likely destroyed the police services building at Diablo Valley College early Monday, investigators said.
“We had two (fires) on the outside and one on the inside in the lobby,” said Contra Costa County Fire Marshal Richard Carpenter. “Probably, the whole building will have to be replaced.”
The fire was reported at 2:25 a.m. in the 1,700-square-foot building located in the southeast corner of the campus by Parking Lot 2. The school runs along Golf Club Road.
The Contra Costa Fire Protection District responded with four engines, one truck and about 20 firefighters.
Carpenter said the fire destroyed the lobby and the rest of the building sustained heavy heat and smoke damage.
DVC spokeswoman Chrisanne Knox said police services, an actual law enforcement department that patrols several campuses within the Contra Costa Community College District, is based at Diablo Valley.
The department has about 20 sworn officers — five to six of whom work at DVC — four higher-ranking officers including a chief, about four dispatchers, two parking officers and 10 to 15 student aides.
On an interim basis, the police department will operate out of a conference room in the business and foreign language department.
“It was designed as an emergency command center and has all the (required communications equipment),” Knox said.
The college is looking at several other locations for a longer-term temporary home for the department.
She said the cost of the damages to the building has not been determined and it is not clear if it will be knocked down or restored.
“There was very little that was salvageable,” she said.
The criminal investigation is being led by the Contra Costa Sheriff’s Office, Knox said, with Pleasant Hill police and the school district police department assisting.
Carpenter said fire investigators are still trying to determine what kind of fuel was used by the arsonist.
Reach Roman Gokhman at 925-945-4780, or at rgokhman@bayareanewsgroup.com.