An office site that Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office officials say will bridge a gap between its Carpinteria and Santa Barbara stations and allow for faster response times opened Wednesday at the Rosewood Miramar Beach Hotel in Montecito.

The small office space on South Jameson Lane will not be fully staffed. Instead, it will serve as a spot where on-duty patrol deputies can handle office work and speak with community members, according to Sheriff Bill Brown.

He said the opening of the site signals “doors to stronger partnerships, greater accessibility, and a deeper connection between the Sheriff’s Office and the community that we serve here in Montecito.”

Community members will be able to call into the office. If no one is there, they will be routed to the dispatch center.

They’ll also be able to come by the office to make a report, Brown said.

“We’re meeting the public where they are, removing barriers and increasing visibility and accessibility,” Brown said. “… By operating more locally, our deputies will spend less time in transit and more time serving this community.”

Brown told Noozhawk that the Sheriff’s Office and the Montecito Association have had discussions about opening a smaller site such as this “for several years,” and they’ve been looking at the space at the Miramar for about a year.

“We looked at a couple of other locations, but they didn’t quite fit the bill for being as accessible as this,” Brown said, pointing to the Miramar’s location right off the freeway.

Rick Caruso, the owner of the Miramar, renovated the space and is allowing the Sheriff’s Office to use it at no cost under an initial five-year agreement. Caruso representatives did not have the numbers immediately available on Wednesday on how much it cost to renovate the space.

Caruso said that when the Miramar was founded, “we always had intended to have a station up here” for first responders.

Caruso, Brown and Santa Barbara County Supervisor Roy Lee, whose district covers the Montecito area, cut the ribbon on the new site.

Lee thanked Caruso, the Sheriff’s Office and the Montecito Association for their work.

“Your vision, your leadership, has really made this happen,” he said.