Medford Police Department

PROJECT PURPOSE

To improve officer and civilian safety by overcoming rural community obstacles in regards to effective radio communication.

EVIDENCE

Interoperability has long been a challenge in emergency response, but is critically important. The radios would be backwards compliant, meaning we can speak with older radio systems. We are wanting to follow the national transition to P25-complaint radios. The COVID-19 public health emergency has also had a negative impact on public safety due to the lack of funds to purchase P25-complaint radios.

POPULATION DESCRIPTION

Our population is mostly elderly individuals, with our local school playing host to approximately 400 children. During the last year, school has been shut down multiple times. We have not been able to keep exact numbers on the covid cases for Medford, but know that in Grant County there have been 717 cases with 8 deaths, which amounts to roughly 16% of the population of Grant County.

PERFORMANCE MEASURING

We would measure our success by becoming P25 compliant and having the ability to successfully communicate with all agencies, no matter how rural of an area we are in.

ONGOING INVESTMENT AMOUNT

$

ONGOING INVESTMENT DESCRIPTION

None

ONGOING INVESTMENT REQUIRED

Able to continue operation without additional funding from the State of Oklahoma