LOVELAND, Ohio — Police officers will be tuning into more frequencies with the addition of new fleet radios in an effort to improve communication and public safety.
Five of the Loveland Police Department's cruisers were outfitted with Motorola APX 4500 P25 CAP-compliant mobile radios last summer. Assistant Chief Dan Gangwer said it was a beneficial upgrade.
"I think any department that can get it — I think it's very important," he said. "Communication among each other, interoperability between jurisdictions, officer safety, potential response times — the whole thing. Communication now is so important to what we do and the fast and fluid way that law enforcement is done now, and the fact that we have so many jurisdictions around us, it's going to be key."
Loveland is situated in a unique position. While the city itself only spans a few square miles, its jurisdictional boundary overlaps Hamilton, Clermont and Warren counties and three townships. That means LPD officers regularly assist or are assisted by neighboring agencies.
While the portable radios worn on officers' uniforms are designed with frequencies to allow for interoperability during an emergency, the older in-cruiser radios only sync with a local frequency, limiting communication to within city limits.
"You get there, the communication devices aren't interoperable and so all the other — the involved departments — suffer because they can't talk to each other," Gangwer said. "So by getting the mobile, it makes it easier because then en route we can actually scan, monitor and talk while we're driving if we have to as we're going to one of the multi-agency types of calls."
Outfitting the department's other six cruisers will cost around $30,000. While Gangwer said that's not in the department's budget, a recently awarded $27,000 grant from the Ohio Office of Criminal Justice Services will only require LPD to pay around $3,000 out-of-pocket.
The goal is to purchase the radios and install them by the end of the year.
The radios are the latest addition to LPD’s technology. In 2023, the department added body-worn cameras and installed Flock Safety Automated License Plate Readers throughout the city. LPD is also in the process of outfitting its vehicles with GPS preemption, or anticipation, devices. They allow emergency vehicles to connect with all of the city's 13 traffic signal control boxes to receive a green light.
"Technology's sort of taken over law enforcement the last several years," said Gangwer. "You either adapt or you get left behind, so we're doing all we can."
