DHS grants help police get new tech tools

By Josh Dulaney
Inland Valley Daily Bulletin

FONTANA, Calif. — The City Council recently approved the purchase of new tools to fight crime.  The Police Department will get a tactical crisis response system for about $30,500 and 20 hand-held radios for about $66,000.

Sgt. Jeff Decker said the department is not at liberty to discuss the tactical crisis response system, which was purchased with funds from a Homeland Security grant.

"It's a classified system," Decker said. "It wouldn't be beneficial to comment on what it does."

He did say it can function as a communications resource during SWAT and terrorism situations.

One spokesman for the California Office on Homeland Security said it's up to the local officials to talk about their purchases.

"For security reasons, they may not want to give out the specifications," said Jay Allan. "It's law-enforcement sensitive, or something like that. I can't imagine anything being classified. If it is, it's coming from the federal department."

Allan said local agencies can shop the department for qualified equipment. The department in turn will gauge whether the desired equipment is necessary for a community.

The department doesn't want one city to carry one type of equipment in excess, such as top-notch hazardous materials tools, while another town doesn't have any at all, he said.

"You don't want to impair critical city and county capabilities, but you also have to keep in mind state capabilities," he said.

The hand-held radios will replace obsolete devices, some of which are about 15 years old.

"In the world of technology, that's getting your money's worth," Decker said.

Other than batteries, it was getting pretty hard to find replacement parts. And as the department has ballooned to more than 200 officers, it needed additional ones, he said.

More than getting cool gadgets for grown-ups, Decker said, the cops are just happy to have new equipment to do their jobs.

"If it serves a particular purpose, or augments your capabilities, you like it," Decker said.

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