Working in the stone ages-no MDTs, cell phones, or tablets

[reddead24]

Anyone have experience leading the way on getting their dept on track to update their technology? currently work at an agency where we use the radio for everything from security checks and routine work, to pursuits and fatal crashes. Everyone on one channel, with 40 (ish) officers and 3-4 dispatchers. So it goes without saying that our dispatchers get pretty upset when officers initiate any proactive work. Just wondering if anyone has experience with similar issues and leads on programs out there that i could apply for to get some toughbooks in hand. TIA

[tanksoldier]

I started in a rural sheriffs office in the Colorado Rockies. No MDT... mostly because they were unreliable up there. Probably my most numerous “citizen assist” was giving directions to drivers whose Google maps couldn’t connect.

Dispstch used Open Fox and we had to air everything.

I actually preferred that to where I work now. Here, dispatchers will put things like “infant is no longer choking” in the call notes and expect you to read it while you’re driving code thru town.

[Pogue Mahone]

I started in a rural sheriffs office in the Colorado Rockies. No MDT... mostly because they were unreliable up there

Signal reception issue?

[ninjaba9]

Sounds eerily similar to my agency!

[PeteBroccolo]

Anyone have experience leading the way on getting their dept on track to update their technology? currently work at an agency where we use the radio for everything from security checks and routine work, to pursuits and fatal crashes. Everyone on one channel, with 40 (ish) officers and 3-4 dispatchers. So it goes without saying that our dispatchers get pretty upset when officers initiate any proactive work. Just wondering if anyone has experience with similar issues and leads on programs out there that i could apply for to get some toughbooks in hand. TIA

Does your State Police use MDT (my Force called them mobile work stations - MWS) with a mobile records management system (RMS)?
Maybe they have an External Policing Partner Program (EPPP) where Municipal Police Services (Mun PS) could lease use of the RMS and MWS?
If not your State, maybe a nearby larger Mun PS or Sheriff Dept?

[tanksoldier]

Signal reception issue?

Yep. Mountains..

[westside popo]

I got a little experience in this area and working with a small budget. Would refurbished Toughbooks suit you? What are y'all using to do your reports?

[Aidokea]

I got a little experience in this area and working with a small budget. Would refurbished Toughbooks suit you? What are y'all using to do your reports?

When I got hired, our department used a simple report writing computer program that looked exactly like the police reports that it printed. It even had a "duplicate" button, so if we kept having the same case over and over, we could just duplicate it, update the report number and date/time, and ship it. It was also VERY searchable.

It even allowed us to make gag reports that were not part of the actual records system, to add a little levity to our tours of duty, like making a misdemeanor sex assault report and listing our Lieutenant as both the victim and the offender.

Years later, we "upgraded" to a 16 million dollar report writing computer program where you had to click through page after page after page, with all sorts of cryptic sub-menus and pull-down tabs, required manually re-entering the same information over and over and over, and it bore absolutely zero resemblance to the reports that it printed. It was like trying to put a puzzle together in the dark, wearing mittens. It one broke down repeatedly, lost massive amounts of reports, filled up and jammed, required constant repairs and upgrades, and so on. I am convinced that no actual cops were involved in making it.

We all attended a two day class to try to learn how to use it, but the class was like trying to learn quantum physics in two days. My first arrest took half a dozen officers, a Sergeant, and a Lieutenant about six hours just to complete the custody document...and it was later kicked back. Our department had to create a whole new unit of geeks that could help the rest of us to struggle through it.

Guys actually retired early, just to get away from it.