For Ovetta Williams, a 60-year resident of George Washington Carver Homes, Friday’s groundbreaking of the GWC Homes Police Precinct was an exciting time.

“It’s great,” Williams said. “It’ll be a help.”

A collaboration between the Selma Housing Authority, the City of Selma and the Selma Community Housing Development Organization, the GWC Police Precinct was designed to provide additional police presence for the homes and the community surrounding them.

Ward 8 councilman Corey Bowie said the sub-station, which is set to open in early June, will be an asset for the entire community.

“Hopefully, not only will the precinct serve as a deterrence factor, but also serve as a way that the police officers can bond with residents,” Bowie said.

The sub-station will operate just like a regular police station, and it has the space to accommodate seven officers, their workstations and a conference area.

“We’re very excited about this and we look forward to the elimination of drug problems here at GWC,” George Needham, Selma Housing Authority Board of Commissioners chairman, said. “I say that because the use of drugs by our children and our young adults effectively ruins their lives. A child that gets into drugs early never really gets out of them, and so the work that Chief [William T.] Riley and the drug task force are doing is something we should all applaud everyday.”

The initial plan for the sub-station was to house it in an existing building that had once been used as a community store. However, because renovation costs were deemed too high, a decision to move the precinct inside a renovated section of the GWC Homes Community Center was made by city and housing officials.

Probate Judge Kim Ballard said he was convinced that having a neighborhood police presence in GWC was going to do a lot of good for everyone in the community.

“If anybody says that positive things aren’t going on in this city, they’re not riding on the same streets that I’m riding on,” Ballard said. “They’re not going to the same meetings that I go to.”

Mayor George Evans said the precinct was a result of hard work and commitment from all parties involved and that, regardless of the negative publicity that at times surrounded the project, it was here for the purpose of making a difference in the ward and in the City of Selma.

“This is what community policing is all about, putting the police back into the community from which it serves,” Selma Chief of Police William T. Riley added. “This is just the beginning of hopefully many precincts that we can push back into the community to make the residents feel safer. We will continue to make the City of Selma safe and this is one huge step in that direction.”