Police cruisers get GPS system
By Caitlyn Kelleher JOURNAL REPORTER

The Police Department has taken another technological step into protecting officer safety by installing a GPS system in the cruisers.

The system will allow the cruisers to be monitored thorugh a computer that will show their locations in town or across the country, said Police Chief Loring Barrett.

"It's primarily for officer safety," he said but added, "it's going to increase our response time."

The response time will be increased because the dispatcher will be able to see immediately which cruiser and officer is closest to a call because a television monitor is now located in the dispatch center with the information.

But the police officer's safety is the number one priority with this system, Barrett said.

The GPS was installed in the cruisers through the money from the grant, which also put laptops in the cruisers. Barrett was able to purchase the software at the end of June to install the system, which will be transportable to the new building when that is completed.

The GPS is similar to that which is used by the Westminster Police and Fire departments.

"You see more of these systems going into dispatch centers," he said.

Over the course of time other town department vehicles can be added to the system such as the fire department, the Light Department or the Department of Public Works.

Barrett's next goal is to install GPS mapping in all of the cruiser computers so that officers can always get where they are going without having rely on the dispatcher for those directions.