Ashland, Alabama, police adopts new technology

Six years ago there was one computer in the Ashland, Alabama, Police Department. Two years ago there were a few more, but officers were still filling out accident reports by hand, stenciling in drawings of cars, trucks and intersections.

Several grants and nearly $300,000 later, officers are typing up reports on in-car computers, scanning fingerprints, and instantly checking for matches with other police departments around the state.

“The vision of the police department changed [to] where we realized if we were to keep up with society, we needed to be more technologically advanced,” said police Chief Benny Davis. “In today’s world, it’s nothing to hop over to Talladega or Anniston.”

The Anniston Star reports that Davis spearheaded an effort to reshape and equip his 8-officer department in 2006, when he became chief. Because of the city’s limited tax base, however, the department needed grant money. So Davis kept his eye out for grants and worked with the city’s grant writer, eventually securing several Department of Justice and Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs grants worth just under $300,000.

Now every squad car has a computer, digital video recorder and surveillance equipment. Every file is typed up and turned in electronically. On Tuesday afternoon, Davis ordered small digital video cameras for each officer that clip onto the uniform’s front chest pocket. Ashland City Council is expected to vote soon on whether it will provide officers with weapons and ammunition.

Under current policy, officers have to bring their own guns.

“It’s a step-by-step process and we’re not done. You can’t stop,” Davis said, noting that every police department, regardless of size and resources, deals with the same crimes.

“The next step for us — and we’re going to have to do a joint venture — is a step toward analytical intelligence gathering.”

That would take all three law-enforcement departments in the county hiring an analyst to look at emergency calls and crimes to figure out when and where officers should focus their attention during their shifts — fighting crime as efficiently as possible.

While officers still have to hit the streets to figure out when and where crimes are committed, the technology that’s now a part of their routine reduces the number of hours they have to spend on paperwork and increases the time they can be on the street.

“Instead of taking up time here,” said Officer Joseph Stanford, sitting in an office, “we can be out on the streets being seen somewhere.”

Filling out an accident report used to take up to three hours, Stanford said. Officers would write in all the details, stencil in drawings of cars and intersections and send them along to superior officers, who in turn sent them back for rewrites all marked up with red pen.

“When I first started here, it was like grading papers,” Stanford said, who joined the force three years ago.

It takes thirty minutes with the department’s current software. Officers can fill it out whenever they have downtime at the scene and turn it in by hooking their laptops up to the station’s server.

“We do everything we need to do in that car,” said investigator David Martin. “It’s a lot more efficient.”