HOLYOKE — The Holyoke Police Department was awarded $35,099 from the Eward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance grant program which will help upgrade some of their current systems.
The Bureau of Justice Assistance seeks applications for formula funding to provide additional personnel and/or purchase equipment, supplies, contractual support, training, technical assistance and information systems for criminal justice or civil proceedings including several program areas.
Those program areas include law enforcement, prosecution and court programs, prevention and education programs, corrections and community programs, drug treatment and enforcement, crime victim and witness initiatives and planning, evaluation and technology improvement programs.
Holyoke Police Sgt. Joseph Zurheide discussed the grant and said they are focusing on three main areas to spend the grant.
The first area that grant will help is the records department, which is right when you walk into the station, get new radios and furniture.
“Everything we do we communicate with our records department. They confirm everything on their systems, so when officers are out on the street they’re always talking to records department and the radios that are in there are outdated and are no longer working. They’re constantly going down which causes delays both to the public and the officers doing the job,” Zurheide said.
He also explained that they will be upgrading the telephone system throughout the station by replacing all the current telephones and getting new ones.
Zurheide explained, “Due to the fact the current system that we have is no longer supported so if anything isn’t working, we aren’t able to fix it or replace it any longer.”
The third area the grant will cover is purchasing a cradlepoint.
A cradlepoint is a cellphone signal for the station so if the power goes out at the station, the computers will run on the cellular signal so officers can still do their reports and access the system.
He also stated that he will be able to use the $35,000 for all three programs along with some desks and chairs also built into the cost.
City Councilor At-Large Patti Devine talked about the grant at the Jan. 7 City Council meeting.
She said, “[Zurheide] did a great job a small amount of money but he’s doing a great thing.”
The Finance Committee and City Council both approved the acceptance of the grant.
