Lucas County Sheriff Tharp says new technology is important for the safety and responsiveness of deputies. “Whether we are going into another county or assistance is coming into our county and doesn’t know the roads as well, we can now just look at a computer,” he says. “They can see us and we can see them. Our response times will definitely be cut down due to the new technology.”
Mobile Architecture for Communications Handling (MACH) is a software program provided by the state and is used for GPS, real time data and mapping and instant messaging. Iowa Select Farms is honored to assist Lucas County in purchasing five laptops to install in patrol cars with a $5,000 Community Care Grant. The laptops purchased will give Tharp and the other deputies new technology to ensure the safety of their community.
“Most everybody has had these computers for 10 or 15 years,” Tharp says. “Right now, we aren’t getting the information from state troopers and other deputies because we don’t have the software and it isn’t coming in over the radio. So we are out of the loop. That’s my biggest reason for purchasing the laptops, so that we will have MACH.”
In addition to MACH, the new laptops will allow for another software called Traffic and Criminal Software (TraCS). This software is used for electronic accident reporting and running a driver’s license from the vehicle. “Citations and warnings will now be done from the vehicle on a computer instead of by hand,” Tharp says. “Now you can print an accident report or citation from the field and hand it to the driver instead. Before, deputies had to come back to the Law Center, type the information in a computer and have the driver come pick it up.”
