Secure storage solutions for equipment keep Kilgore Police Department organized and more efficient.

Despite being a small-town police force, the Kilgore PD had much on their plate. They served a community of nearly 15,000 with a force of 37 sworn officers and over 20 civilian employees. They maintained a tactical response team and a school resource team and ran their own jail.

Their various public safety responsibilities meant they needed to maintain several different types of equipment, rifle shields for officers in tactical response situations, less than lethal (LTL) weapons, such as pepper guns and tasers, and specialized incident response resources for their jail. 

But while he trusted his officers, Chief Todd Hunter worried that their pen-and-paper logging system created too many chances for gear to be left unaccounted for or opportunities to go missing. “We’d never lost equipment before, but we sometimes didn’t know where a resource was or who had it for certain periods.”

Equipment and gear were stored on racks in the armory. Without designated tracking lockers to return those assets, officers would often take items home at night if they were heading straight home from patrol, intending to return them in the morning. However, if they forgot to notify their superiors, other staff would sometimes waste time tracking down gear believed to be missing.

Chief Hunter decided the Kilgore PD needed to proactively update its tracking system before an issue arose.

Chief Hunter was most concerned about items that cost a lot to replace, like rifle shields. But they also wanted better accountability and tracking so it was easier to identify who had signed out each item and when. As the Chief correctly recognized, lost time spent searching for and manually managing assets could add up fast.

One of Chief Hunter’s staff members was familiar with ecos systems, so they reached out directly to see the options available to meet their unique needs. ecos specialists were able to design a multi-compartment locker system that could hold all of their different items and fit within their available space. All lockers had weight management scales to verify which items officers took or returned. For efficiency, they opted to use prox cards for access control.

The Kilgore Police Department now has a fully electronic equipment management system, allowing them to locate gear instantly. “We love the ability to track equipment electronically,” Chief Hunter said. The Kilgore Police Department now has continuous, real-time visibility into the use of equipment and other essential assets.

Thanks to the ecos care cloud-based management software, Chief Hunter’s staff can efficiently manage access without compromising security or accountability. “[the ecos lockers] are quite efficient. We’re able to maintain better control. We can better organize and account for all our equipment. I would recommend the product and the company. The organizational gains are significant.”

The rollout was so successful that they plan to replace their electronic key cabinets with new ones from ecos.